title: The role of bacterial super infection in extensive pulmonary tuberculosis. Data from protected brush cultures in untreated patients from the University of South Alabama Medical Center, Mobile, Alabama, USA.
abstract: Pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) and bacterial pneumonia are both characterized by fever, cough, and purulent sputum production. Although TB alone can cause these symptoms, the possibility of a concomitant bacterial pneumonia has led some clinicians to treat these patients empirically with antibacterial agents. Neither the benefit of such empiric antibiotic therapy nor transtracheal aspirate cultures from patients with pulmonary TB have yielded consistent results. Consequently, we performed a prospective study to obtain lower airway secretions via a bronchoscopic protected specimen brush (PSB) technique for quantitative aerobic and anaerobic cultures from untreated patients with extensive pulmonary TB (defined as cavitary disease or involvement of > or = 3 segments). We obtained bronchoscopic samples from 3 untreated men aged 21, 61, and 60 years with extensive pulmonary TB. There was no significant bacterial growth (aerobic or anaerobic) from the specimens obtained. These results, therefore, do not support the hypothesis that bacterial pneumonia is a common concomitant of extensive pulmonary TB.
authors.affiliation: Keesler Medical Center, Keesler Air Force Base, Mississippi.
authors.forename: R m
authors.initials: Rm
authors.lastname: Middleton
authors.forename: M B
authors.initials: MB
authors.lastname: Kirkpatrick
authors.forename: J B
authors.initials: JB
authors.lastname: Bass
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001424:Bacterial Infections / Q000150:complications; D001999:Bronchoscopy; D006801:Humans; D008168:Lung / Q000382:microbiology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009894:Opportunistic Infections / Q000150:complications*; D011014:Pneumonia / Q000150:complications*; D011446:Prospective Studies; D013183:Sputum / Q000382:microbiology; D015163:Superinfection / Q000150:complications* / Q000382:microbiology; D014397:Tuberculosis, Pulmonary / Q000150:complications* / Q000382:microbiology