Confronting the scientific obstacles to global control of tuberculosis
J. Clin. Invest. Douglas B. Young, et al. 118:1255 doi:10.1172/JCI34614 [Go to this article.]

Figure 1
Pulmonary TB in a patient who was sputum smear positive. (A) TB has many clinical manifestations, but the most common form of the disease in adults is a chronic pulmonary disease. Shown here is a 3D reconstruction of a high-resolution tomography series of an individual with extensive TB disease. (B) The most common way to diagnose TB is by microscopic analysis of sputum to visualize M. tuberculosis; a positive diagnosis is obtained after spreading a sputum sample on a microscope slide, fixing, applying a stain, decolorizing with acid, counterstaining, and visualizing the acid-fast tubercle bacilli. However, this method is not very sensitive and only detects 60% of culture-positive patients with pulmonary TB. This delays early diagnosis and can result in substantial lung damage and transmission of the disease-causing pathogen before therapy is started. Original magnification, ×1,000.