Chest
Original ResearchMycobacterial DiseaseUse of an Interferon-γ Release Assay To Diagnose Latent Tuberculosis Infection in Foreign-Born Patients
Section snippets
Study Subjects
This study was approved by the institutional review boards of the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH) and the Columbia University Medical Center. All subjects provided written, informed consent. We enrolled 123 subjects from a New York City DOHMH tuberculosis clinic from September 8, 2005, through February 21, 2007. Those enrolled included contacts of cases of active tuberculosis (“contacts”) and subjects who were not contacts of patients with active tuberculosis
Excluded Subjects
We enrolled 123 subjects, of whom 27 were excluded. Four subjects never returned to have their TST results read. Three subjects were identified after enrollment who had positive TST results > 6 months prior, and a repeat TST was not done as per protocol. Two subjects were determined to be HIV positive. One subject had been previously treated for LTBI but did not recall this information until after enrollment. Disseminated M bovis infection was diagnosed in one patient. Phlebotomy was
Discussion
We have demonstrated that, compared with TST, the T-SPOT.TB test has improved specificity in identifying a group of subjects at high risk for progression to active tuberculosis, namely, close contacts of cases of active tuberculosis. Our study demonstrates the superiority of the T-SPOT.TB test over the TST under routine clinical conditions in a population critical to tuberculosis control: foreign-born persons from high-prevalence countries with high rates of BCG vaccination. These findings
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2015, Revue de Pneumologie CliniqueLongitudinal follow-up of contact subjects of cases of tuberculosis in Paris
2015, Revue des Maladies RespiratoiresRecent latent tuberculous infection (LTBI) in different sub-groups of contacts
2012, Revue des Maladies RespiratoiresScreening contacts for latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) using an interferon test in Paris in 2009
2012, Revue des Maladies Respiratoires
Equipment for this study was provided by Oxford Immunotec, Ltd, Oxford, UK.
Dr. Brodie is supported in part by a grant from the Stony Wold-Herbert Fund, Inc. Dr. Schluger is supported in part by the National Institutes of Health/National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (K24 HL004074). Dr. Lederer is supported in part by grant RR024157 from the National Institutes of Health.
The authors have no financial or other potential conflicts of interests to disclose.