title: Detection of pulmonary and extrapulmonary tuberculosis patients with the 38-kilodalton antigen from Mycobacterium tuberculosis in a rapid membrane-based assay.
abstract: A rapid membrane-based serologic assay using the 38-kDa antigen from Mycobacterium tuberculosis for the diagnosis of tuberculosis (TB) was evaluated with 201 patients with pulmonary TB, 67 patients with extrapulmonary TB, 79 Mycobacterium bovis BCG-vaccinated healthy controls, and 77 non-TB respiratory patients. The overall sensitivities, specificities, and positive and negative predictive values were, respectively, 92, 92, 84, and 96% for sputum-positive TB patients; 70, 92, 87, and 79% for sputum-negative TB patients; and 76, 92, 80, and 90% for extrapulmonary-TB patients. Only 2% (1 of 44) of the healthy control BCG-vaccinated subjects gave weak positive signals in the assay, indicating that this rapid serological assay is a valuable aid in clinical diagnosis for both pulmonary and extrapulmonary TB.
authors.affiliation: ICT Diagnostics, Sydney, Australia.
authors.forename: A T
authors.initials: AT
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.forename: W L
authors.initials: WL
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.forename: P Y
authors.initials: PY
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: R A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Cole
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000907:Antibodies, Bacterial / Q000378:metabolism; D000942:Antigens, Bacterial / Q000276:immunology*; D002681:China; D006801:Humans; D015151:Immunoblotting; D008875:Middle Aged; D009169:Mycobacterium tuberculosis / Q000276:immunology*; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D014376:Tuberculosis / Q000276:immunology; D014397:Tuberculosis, Pulmonary / Q000276:immunology*
chemical_list: D000907:Antibodies, Bacterial; D000942:Antigens, Bacterial