It can be difficult for clinicians to distinguish a paradoxical response to antituberculous therapy, worsening of an existing lesion despite adequate treatment, treatment failure, and drug resistance. We report a case of a 69-year-old woman who experienced bilateral lower extremity paralysis secondary to a paradoxical response. She had been suffering for 1 month from low back pain, due to tuber...

BACKGROUND Tuberculous endophthalmitis is very rare with only 18 reports published worldwide and only a few cases in Japan. We report a case of tuberculous endophthalmitis successfully treated with vitrectomy followed by antituberculous agents. FINDINGS An 81-year-old man was referred to us due to the exacerbation of vitreous opacity on his left eye(OS) after he had received the corticosteroi...

The rise of multidrug-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis has complicated therapy for tuberculosis and led us to search for a potentially active combination of drugs against these strains. The susceptibilities of 12 strains of multidrug-resistant M. tuberculosis to standard antituberculous drugs (isoniazid, rifampin, ethambutol, and pyrazinamide), clarithromycin, and its metabolite, 14-hydroxy...

Although tuberculosis is a recognised cause of adrenal insufficiency, little is known about adrenal function in patients with active tuberculosis. Ninety Melanesian adults with active tuberculosis (30 pulmonary, 30 miliary, 30 extrapulmonary) had adrenal function assessed prospectively before and three to four weeks after starting antituberculous chemotherapy. Basal serum cortisol concentration...

It has been shown previously that fluoroquinolone resistance (defined by resistance to at least 2 mg/liter ofloxacin) has a different impact on moxifloxacin monotherapy depending on the mutation in the sole fluoroquinolone target in Mycobacterium tuberculosis, i.e., DNA gyrase. Since tuberculosis treatment relies on multidrug therapy, we wished to determine the impact of fluoroquinolone resista...

BACKGROUND A study was conducted to evaluate the effect of the empirical use of fluoroquinolones on the timing of antituberculous treatment and the outcome of patients with tuberculosis in an endemic area. METHODS All patients with culture confirmed tuberculosis aged > or =14 years diagnosed between July 2002 and December 2003 were included and their medical records were reviewed. RESULTS S...

We studied 51 patients with osteo-articular tuberculosis who were divided into two groups. Group I comprised 31 newly-diagnosed patients who were given first-line antituberculous treatment consisting of isoniazid, rifampicin, ethambutol and pyrazinamide. Group II (non-responders) consisted of 20 patients with a history of clinical non-responsiveness to supervised uninterrupted antituberculous t...