Assessment of a set of microbiological and molecular genetic studies for the diagnosis of tuberculosis

Abstract

Much clinical material (more than 9,500 diagnostic samples) was used to evaluate the efficiency of using different microbiological and molecular genetic studies for the diagnosis of tuberculosis in laboratory practice. Current accelerated techniques (a bacteriological assay with liquid media and a Bactec MGIT 960 analyzer, as well as molecular genetic studies) compared to traditional methods for tuberculosis diagnosis (microscopy, dense media culture) were found to have advantages in the time spent to obtain results and in the efficient detection of mycobacteria. The results of studies performed by different methods were compared and it was shown that a set of traditional and accelerated microbiological and molecular genetic methods should be concurrently employed to enhance the efficiency of tuberculosis diagnosis.