Author’s response to reviews Title: Evaluation of Mycobacterium tuberculosis viability in OMNIgene-SPUTUM reagent upon multi-day transport at ambient temperature Authors:

Evaluation of Mycobacterium tuberculosis viability in OMNIgene-SPUTUM reagent upon multi-day transport at ambient temperature

BACKGROUND Maintaining the quality of clinical specimens for tuberculosis (TB) testing is a major challenge in many high TB burden-limited resources countries. Sample referral systems in low and middle income countries are often weak and the maintenance of the cold-chain challenging and very costly for TB programs. The development of transport media allowing the preservation of samples without ...

Laboratory evaluation of a specimen transport medium for downstream molecular processing of sputum samples to detect Mycobacterium tuberculosis.

BACKGROUND Modern molecular-based approaches for the detection of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in sputum samples promise quicker and more accurate detection of cases. However, processing sputum samples at central diagnostic facilities provides a diagnostic approach, but requires a safe and efficient system that is not affected by transport delays and ambient temperature to be feasible. We evaluat...

Author’s response to reviews Title: Incident Mycobacterium tuberculosis Infection in Household Contacts of Infectious Tuberculosis patients in Brazil Authors:

OMNIgene.SPUTUM suppresses contaminants while maintaining Mycobacterium tuberculosis viability and obviates cold-chain transport

Tuberculosis (TB) diagnostics are centralised, requiring long-distance transportation of specimens in most resource-limited settings. We evaluated the ability of OMNIgene.SPUTUM (OM-S) to obviate cold-chain transport of TB specimens. A two-arm (same-day and after 5 days sample processing) study was conducted to assess contamination rates and Mycobacterium tuberculosis viability in OM-S-treated ...

Author’s response to reviews Title: Exposure to Ambient Air Pollution and Calcification of the Mitral Annulus and Aortic Valve: The Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA) Authors:

Title: Exposure to Ambient Air Pollution and Calcification of the Mitral Annulus and Aortic Valve: The Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA) Authors: Martin Tibuakuu ([email protected]) Miranda Jones ([email protected]) Ana Navas-Acien ([email protected]) Di Zhao ([email protected]) Eliseo Guallar ([email protected]) Amanda Gassett ([email protected]) Lianne Sheppard (sheppard...