Posts Tagged ‘tuberculosis’

One of the reasons why tuberculosis is such a difficult disease to eradicate is that the bacteria, Mycobacterium tuberculosis, can evade our immune systems so well that treatment for the infection often involves taking daily pills for six to nine months. Furthermore, the actual symptoms of infection tend to go away after just two months of therapy, so the incentive to carry on is negligible. This is where MIT medical engineer Jose Gomez-Marquez brilliantly devised a scheme to get people interested in taking their medications. The project is called “XoutTB” and it involves stamp-sized special paper patches that reveal a code when they come into contact with urine containing traces of antituberculosis medication. When patients urinate on these test strips everyday the code they reveal can be sent via text message to phone companies who will then credit the patient-customer with free talk time minutes. A trial involving 30 tuberculosis patients proved to be a success and a larger, second trial of XoutTB will be starting soon in Pakistan.

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A pediatric medical resident at Northwestern University may have exposed hundreds of patients to tuberculosis (TB). The female physician, whose name has not been released, likely did not know she was infected with TB since she was diagnosed just last week. During the past ten months she has worked at three Chicago area hospitals-Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Children’s Memorial Hospital, and Evanston Hospital-where she had contacts with over 300 patients. TB can be transmitted via coughing, sneezing, talking – anytime saliva can be aerosolized. Tuberculosis is a difficult disease to contain for the very reason that those who harbor disease may not know they have it. Learn more about tuberculosis.

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Almost 7,000 people died from HIV/AIDS in China during the first nine months of 2008, making HIV the leading cause of death from infection. Tuberculosis and rabies have fallen to second and third places. Just three years ago, less than 8,000 Chinese in total had died from HIV/AIDS. However, with the tremendous movement of populations from the countryside to cities, and the gradual shift towards a less conservative society, the spread of HIV has gained momentum. Initially, HIV primarily affected injection drug workers. Now, the main cause of transmission is thought to be unsafe sex.

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Tuberculosis (TB) is one of the world’s most widespread diseases. Nearly one third of the world’s population has been exposed and 8 million people annually develop active TB. For those who are infected and have latent TB, the treatment is a grueling nine-month-long course with a drug called isoniazid. Now, researchers from McGill University are revealing the results of a multi-national study which shows that four months of treatment with another TB drug, rifampin, is better than the traditional treatment, and confers less liver side effects. Because of this, people are more likely to complete the full course of treatment.

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