The Cobas Amplicor PCR system (CA-PCR) was compared with culture and staining for acid-fast bacilli (AFB) for the early detection of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in respiratory clinical specimens and otherwise normal sterile body fluids. The sensitivity, specificity and positive and negative predictive values of CA-PCR were determined with AFB-positive and AFB-negative specimens. The sensitivity of CA-PCR ranged from 73.6% to 100% for AFB-positive samples, while sputa collected after bronchoscopy were the most useful specimens, with 70% sensitivity and 98.6% specificity among the AFB-negative samples.

Background: Clinical microbiology laboratories should provide reliable results on susceptibility testing of Mycobacterium tuberculosis to different agents. Methods: The manual Mycobacteria Growth Indicator Tube (MGIT) and Etest were compared to the method of proportion (MOP) for susceptibility testing of 88 clinical isolates of M. tuberculosis against isoniazid (INH), rifampin (RIF), streptomycin (STR) and ethambutol (EMB). Isolates were recovered from different patients and were identified at species level by PCR and hybridization. Results: Resistance to INH was detected in 20.5, 29.5 and 12.5% of the isolates, followed by STR resistance (19.3, 26.1 and 1.1%), RIF (9.1, 4.5 and 5.7%) and EMB (2.3, 11.4 and 2.3%) by the MOP, MGIT and Etest, respectively. Sensitivity of the manual MGIT ranged from 37.5% for RIF resistance to 100% for EMB, while Etest sensitivity ranged from 5.9% for STR to 62.5% for RIF. Conclusions: MOP remains the method of choice, with the manual MGIT showing superior sensitivity at detecting resistance to INH, STR and EMB compared to the Etest.