Treating refugee patients with severe disseminated tuberculosis (TB) who do not have HIV presents unique diagnostic and therapeutic challenges, requiring heightened awareness, comprehensive medical histories despite language barriers, and a multidisciplinary team effort between healthcare providers, social workers, clinical psychologists, and nutritionists, according to a grand rounds report published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.

Receiving antiviral treatment for hepatitis B (HBV) at the time of tuberculosis (TB) diagnosis reduced hospitalizations as a result of drug-induced liver injury by 56%, indicating that patients with TB and HBV co-infection should be given antiviral treatment for HBV when anti-TB therapy is initiated, according to a study published in Clinical Infectious Diseases.

Although the new interferon-gamma release assay QuantiFERON-TB Gold Plus® (QFT-Plus) had good sensitivity in children with pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) only, QFT-Plus had poor sensitivity in children with extra-pulmonary TB only, according to a study published in PLoS One.

Despite reducing the median time to culture conversion, replacing ethambutol with moxifloxacin has not shown efficacy in recurrent tuberculosis treatment success in an 8-week trial, according to a study published in Clinical Infectious Diseases.

Co-infection of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and tuberculosis (TB) may be associated with decreased neurological and neuropsychological functioning, according to a study published in Clinical Infectious Diseases.

An automated molecular assay can detect Mycobacterium tuberculosis with resistance to drugs directly from sputum specimens, according to a study published the New England Journal of Medicine.