| Abstract: | The AIDS epidemic has led to the resurgence of tuberculosis.Extrapulmonary manifestations may appear in over half of thepatients who are dually infected. This has resulted in a risingincidence of tuberculous pericarditis in several parts of Africasuch as Tanzania. We tested a solid-phase antibody competitionsandwich ELISA (SACT-SE) as a potential means of diagnosingtuberculous pericarditis. Fifty-one African patients with clinicallydiagnosed tuberculous pericardial effusion (of whom 25 had confirmationby pericardial fluid culture) were tested using a monoclonalantibody (CDC/WHO ref. no. IT39) which was raised against aspecific epitope on the Mycobacterium tuberculosis 30 kDa antigen.All but one patient had negative sputum microscopy for acid-fastbacilli. A sensitivity of 61 %(at 96%specificity) was achieved.Sera from 25 African patients with smear-positive tuberculosiswere also examined; of which 20 tested positive (sensitivity80%). This is the largest study to date on the potential applicationof serology in diagnosing pericardial tuberculosis. |
