Improving diagnostic mechanism key to tackling multi-drug resistant TB

With multi-drug resistant tuberculosis emerging as a major obstacle in the fight against the disease, healthcare experts have advocated a collective move towards improving diagnostic mechanism that helps in its accurate diagnosis.

A symposium on appropriate diagnostic mechanism to fight drug-resistant TB was organised at AIIMS in collaboration with global medical technology company BD.

It was inaugurated by former Director General of ICMR V M Katoch and presided over by S K Acharya, Dean of Research, AIIMS. The experts said inaccurate and delayed diagnosis continues to be a major challenge, which also perpetuates spread of drug-resistant TB.

Adoption of liquid-based TB drug susceptibility testing on a larger scale is key to improving timely diagnosis of drug-resistant TB, they said. "Inaccurate and delayed diagnosis of TB continues to be a challenge in both public and private sectors. In early stages when the drug resistance starts developing, a new crop of MDR bacteria erupts which cannot be detected by molecular methods but only by liquid culture methods.

"Therefore, whenever there is a suspicion of MDR-TB, the samples must be subjected to phenotypic second line drug susceptibility testing, using liquid culture systems," said Sarman Singh, Head, Division of Clinical Microbiology and Molecular Medicine, AIIMS. His team's findings, published in 2011, demonstrate that approximately 4.5 per cent of family members of a TB patient do not seek medical attention despite getting infected.

"TB treatment and control programmes should focus on accurate and timely diagnosis, identification of clinically appropriate treatment regimens, patient monitoring and follow-up," said Varun Khanna, Managing Director, India and South Asia, BD.