       Document 0866
 DOCN  M9620866
 TI    Laboratory contamination of Mycobacterium tuberculosis cultures.
 DT    9602
 AU    Dunlap NE; Harris RH; Benjamin WH Jr; Harden JW; Hafner D; Department of
       Microbiology, University of Alabama at Birmingham,; USA.
 SO    Am J Respir Crit Care Med. 1995 Nov;152(5 Pt 1):1702-4. Unique
       Identifier : AIDSLINE MED/96048836
 AB    The purpose of this study was to investigate possible laboratory
       contamination of Mycobacterium tuberculosis cultures which resulted in
       the misdiagnosis of tuberculosis. We have investigated three cases in
       which a patient's culture was positive for M. tuberculosis but there was
       not a high clinical suspicion for disease. In each instance, another
       patient with clinically obvious pulmonary tuberculosis had specimens
       cultured concurrently within the same clinical laboratory. The isolates
       from both the obvious cases of tuberculosis and the suspect cases were
       obtained through the State of Alabama TB Laboratory, but these isolates
       originated at a commercial laboratory, a community hospital laboratory,
       and at a university hospital. MTB isolates were fingerprinted by probing
       for the insertion sequence IS6110. With each of the three pairs of
       isolates (case and suspicious case), identical IS6110 banding patterns
       were found suggesting identical MTB strains. Because the patients were
       geographically separated, it is strongly suspected that laboratory
       contamination of M. tuberculosis cultures resulted in the three suspect
       cases being diagnosed with tuberculosis. These findings indicate that
       positive M. tuberculosis cultures resulting from laboratory
       contamination can occur.
 DE    Adult  Aged  Aged, 80 and over  Bronchoalveolar Lavage
       Fluid/MICROBIOLOGY  Case Report  Diagnostic Errors  DNA Fingerprinting
       Female  Human  HIV Seronegativity  Leukemia, Promyelocytic,
       Acute/COMPLICATIONS  Male  Middle Age  Mycobacterium
       tuberculosis/GENETICS/*ISOLATION & PURIF  *Specimen Handling  Support,
       Non-U.S. Gov't  Tuberculosis, Pulmonary/DIAGNOSIS  JOURNAL ARTICLE

       SOURCE: National Library of Medicine.  NOTICE: This material may be
       protected by Copyright Law (Title 17, U.S.Code).

