Fco. Fandinho et al., DIAGNOSIS OF DISSEMINATED MYCOBACTERIAL INFECTION - TESTING A SIMPLE AND INEXPENSIVE METHOD FOR USE IN DEVELOPING-COUNTRIES, Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 75(4), 1997, pp. 361-366
With the development of the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS)
epidemic, the isolation of mycobacteria from blood has become a common
problem for clinical laboratories, In this study two methods were use
d for the recovery of mycobacteria from blood specimens obtained from
AIDS patients: (I) direct inoculation of a biphasic medium, and (2) a
non-commercial lysis-centrifugation method A total of 3 consecutive bl
ood samples were taken at 15-minute intervals from each of 50 AIDS pat
ients with clinical suspicion of disseminated mycobacterial disease. M
ycobacterium growth was noted in 70/138 blood specimens from 30 (60%)
patients. These cultures yielded Mycobacterium tuberculosis in 19 (63%
) and Mycobacterium avium complex organisms in 11 (37%) patients. Cult
ures using the lysis-centrifugation method were positive in 54% of the
patients while cultures using biphasic medium were positive in 44% (P
> 0.05). The positivity for M, avium complex was higher with lysis-ce
ntrifugation (91%) than with biphasic medium (45.4%) (P < 0.05). Howev
er, the positivities for M, tuberculosis with the lysis-centrifugation
method (89.5%) and direct inoculation in biphasic medium (100%) were
similar (P > 0.05), The use of a noncommercial lysis-centrifugation te
chnique is inexpensive, reliable, and can be an alternative method for
the diagnosis of mycobacteraemia in developing countries.