TY - JOUR T1 - The usefulness of antimycobacterial antibodies detection in TB diagnosis JF - European Respiratory Journal JO - Eur Respir J VL - 40 IS - Suppl 56 SP - P2638 AU - Elena Cojocaru AU - Codrin Popa AU - Irina Luciana Dumitriu AU - Bogdan Gurzu AU - Cristian Cojocaru Y1 - 2012/09/01 UR - http://erj.ersjournals.com/content/40/Suppl_56/P2638.abstract N2 - Aim: Due to the high number of cases, it could be useful a rapid and cost effective test for early diagnosis of tuberculosis. We planned to evaluate if a test based on detection of anti-lipoarabinomannan antibodies in serum is suitable for diagnose the tuberculosis (TB).Methods: The test used is based on detection of anti-lipoarabinomannan antibodies from the sample using plastic combs. The test is positive if a colored spot appears on plastic comb. We used a randomized lot of patients addressed to Clinic of Pulmonary Diseases, Iasi, Romania.Results: We have tested 46 patients from June 2011 to January 2012 from Iasi County. The final bacteriological results are available for 27 patients in present (February 2012). All the data presented below are just for patients with final evaluations. The average age was 45 years. Based on bacteriological tests 10 cases (37%) were diagnosed with TB. From patients with TB, the rapid serum test was positive in 8 cases (80%), 2 cases were negative. The other 17 cases were culture negative for M. tuberculosis. From negative cases 14 (82.4%) were also negative for rapid TB test, and 3 cases were positive. For all 3 cases negative in bacteriology but positive in rapid TB test were observed opacities in upper lobes. Tuberculin test was positive in one case and not performed in others two. The producer revealed that this test has a sensitivity of 70.2% in patients with pulmonary tuberculosis and a specificity of 95.1%.Conclusion: In the study population, this rapid TB test seems to be interesting for a rapid TB screening. Adding the patients expected for final evaluation is necessary for a more apropiate evaluation of the utility of this rapid TB test. ER -