Childhood tuberculosis accounts for 10% of cases world wide. A new test might get results faster, allowing better treatment and outcome.
In 1995 there was a publication saying tuberculosis (TB) in children should be of concern as its symptoms were not specific and tests difficult to interpret or not helpful at all. Besides, even though children represented a small amount of the cases, they were seen as reservoirs to potentially infect the adults. More important than that, children's disease was, most of the times, only found after the adult's disease was, therefore much later and with worse prognosis. Much was missing back then that might be solved today with more recent techniques.
TB mimics several different common childhood diseases (pneumonia, bacterial and viral infections, malnutrition and HIV) which makes it that much important to find an accurate detection technique.
Researchers from the Imperial College took a genetic approach. From the whole genome, 51 genes were tested for activation or suppression. First, patients in South Africa and Malawi were subjected to this test, with good results. This information provided a TB risk score for each child which, when tested in a third population of patients from Kenya, accurately diagnosed over 80 percent of the children with TB.
And so something that can be called a genetic signature for childhood TB was found. It enables differentiation of TB clinical features from the ones of HIV and other diseases, and therefore an accurate and improved response from healthcare services and better prognosis. TB in Africa still represents a major burden and there is still much to do. Pursuing a cheap, simple and fast test is the next step on a stairway to success.
Cover image: Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Wikimedia commons).
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Alen Piljić
Managing director | Life Science Network gGmbH
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- President | Research Elements Association