TUBERCULOSIS: new form of early test

Thursday, May 27, 2010
By Juan Diasgranados - Doctors hope a new test for tuberculosis will be available soon because it can confirm the presence of the disease in 45 minutes rather than the six weeks required by the current test.
Doctors said they are close to being able to use a new test that will allow them to diagnose cases of drug-resistant tuberculosis in 90 minutes, down from six weeks. Cepheid geneXpert, a new TB test jointly developed by Cepheid and the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, allows specimens to be tested with high-tech equipment in health settings and to produce results while patients are still in their doctors' offices.The test, which doctors hope will be approved soon, would lead to earlier diagnosis and earlier treatment for patients. A spokeswoman for the Food and Drug Administration said the test is under review but had no information about when a decision will be made.The current test, sputum microscopy, was developed in 1882 and is outdated. It takes six weeks to obtain results, and in that time, doctors lose track of some patients and others die.The Center for Global Health Policy held a briefing last week to discuss its new publication, "Confronting the Global HIV and Tuberculosis Epidemics." The center is a project of the Infectious Diseases Society of America and the HIV Medicine Association through a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.The new publication highlights projects doctors and researchers have been working on that will soon allow them to test tuberculosis patients and shrink the time it takes to diagnose drug-resistant tuberculosis from six weeks to 90 minutes. New tuberculosis drugs will offer a safer and faster cure for standard and drug-resistant tuberculosis.According to the center's website, HIV and tuberculosis are the world's top two most deadly infectious diseases. In 2008, 2 million people died from HIV/AIDS. Tuberculosis claimed the lives of 1.8 million people.Doctors and professionals at the briefing spoke about the deadly epidemics and new discoveries in science that can dramatically change the routes of these diseases."A lot has been accomplished," said Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. "But tuberculosis is still a threat, and there's still a lot that needs to be done."Fauci said there is only one vaccine for tuberculosis."The current vaccine right now is not very good ... but I'm staying optimistic that one day soon down the line we will have a more effective vaccine for TB," he said.According to the Center for Global Health Policy, the Bacille Calmette Guerin vaccine is the only vaccine for tuberculosis. The vaccine is effective at preventing the disease in children but not for adults.At the briefing, doctors said patients who are infected with both HIV and tuberculosis usually have a high risk of death. The two diseases work synergistically, speeding up the progression of illness. In 2007, one in four deaths from tuberculosis was HIV related.Speakers echoed the need for new policies and the need to push U.S. officials to make "key decisions" in the next few weeks when the debate over global health spending arises. The center is hoping for more funding to provide more research and diagnostic testing along with opportunities to open treatment centers overseas.Dr. Kenneth Mayer, director of the Brown University AIDS program, emphasized the importance of making people around the world award of these issues."We need to push our government and really think strategically how we use our resources to help this crisis," Mayer said.Mayer ended the briefing by saying, "progress has been made, but more can be done. Tuberculosis is still growing."
http://www.infozine.com/news/stories/op/storiesView/sid/41351/