We present a statistical summary of results from the Model Performance Evaluation Program (MPEP) for Mycobacterium tuberculosis Drug Susceptibility Testing, 1994 to 2008, implemented by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). During that period, a total of 57,733 test results for culture isolates were reported by 216 participating laboratories for the first-line antituberculo...

The objectives of this study were to investigate the origin of highly discordant rifampin (rifampicin) (RMP) drug susceptibility test results obtained for Mycobacterium tuberculosis strains during proficiency testing. Nine Supra-National Tuberculosis Reference Laboratories tested the RMP susceptibilities of 19 selected M. tuberculosis strains, using standard culture-based methods. The strains w...

In order to evaluate the Organon Teknika MB/BacT system used for testing indirect susceptibility to the alternative drugs ofloxacin (OFLO), amikacin (AMI), and rifabutin (RIF), and to the usual drugs of standard treatment regimes such as rifampin (RMP), isoniazid (INH), pyrazinamide (PZA), streptomycin (SM), ethambutol (EMB), and ethionamide (ETH), cultures of clinical specimens from 117 patien...

This study evaluates the serum concentrations of rifampin (RMP), isoniazid (INH), and intestinal barrier function in patients with multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB), drug susceptible tuberculosis (DS-TB), and health volunteers (HC; controls). Peak serum concentrations of RMP were significantly lower in MDR-TB and DS-TB as compared with HC (odds ratio [OR] = 3.125, confidence interval [C...

The objective of the study was to compare the manual Mycobacteria Growth Indicator Tube (MGIT) method and the BACTEC MGIT 960 system to the BACTEC 460 method for susceptibility testing of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. The evaluation was based on testing of 36 M. tuberculosis strains with various susceptibilities to isoniazid (INH), rifampin (RMP), ethambutol (EMB), and streptomycin (SM). In addit...

The objective of this report was to study the pharmacokinetics of rifampin (RMP), isoniazid (INH), and pyrazinamide (PZA) in HIV-infected children with tuberculosis (TB) treated with a thrice-weekly anti-TB regimen in the government program in India. Seventy-seven HIV-infected children with TB aged 1 to 15 years from six hospitals in India were recruited. During the intensive phase of TB treatm...

WQ-3034 is a newly synthesized acidic fluoroquinolone. We assessed its in vitro activity against Mycobacterium tuberculosis and M. avium complex using levofloxacin (LVFX), ciprofloxacin (CPFX), sparfloxacin (SPFX), and KRM-1648 (KRM) as reference drugs. The MICs of these agents were determined by the agar dilution method with 7H11 medium. The MICs at which 50 and 90% of the test strains were in...

A novel method for the detection of any alteration within a defined sequence has recently been demonstrated (A. Lishanski, N. Kurn, and E. F. Ullman, Nucleic Acids Res. 28:E42, 2000; A. Lishanski, Clin. Chem. 46:9, 2000). Essential to this method are the generation of partial duplexes that are capable of forming four-stranded structures and the ability to detect inhibition of branch migration i...

In recent years, new derivatives of rifamide have been developed and tested, particularly rifabutin (RBU) (9) and rifapentine (RPE) (1), which are active on Mycobacterium tuberculosis and other medically important mycobacteria (1, 4, 13, 14). We studied their activity against Mycobacterium leproe in comparison with the activity of rifampin (RMP). Mice were inoculated in the left hind footpad (1...

The reliability of the Mycobacteria Growth Indicator Tube (MGIT) 960 system for rapid antimicrobial susceptibility testing (AST) of Mycobacterium tuberculosis was evaluated. Forty-seven isolates, including 10 fully susceptible and 37 resistant strains, were tested for susceptibility to the critical concentrations of streptomycin (STR), isoniazid (INH), rifampin (RMP), and ethambutol (EMB), as r...