3 years of successful Mycobakterium tuberculosis diagnosis by real time PCR

A routine oriented Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) based typing procedure for the detection of Mycobakterium tuberculosis (Mtb) out of Paraffin embedded (e.g. lymph nodes), as well as native material has been developed. The detected multicopy IS6110 sequence, present in the majority of Mtb strains, but not encountered in nontuberculous bacteria, accounts for the extremely low sensitivity level of only 1 bacterial genome per PCR reaction (approximately 4 fg of DNA). The method was approved by the external proficiency testing program of INSTAND in 2003 (Institut fuer Standardisierung und Dokumentation im medizinischen Laboratorium, Duesseldorf, Tuberkulosediagnostik IV). Internal positive amplification control is guaranteed by the inclusion of an artificial DNA fragment in each PCR reaction. The diagnostic system is currently employed by a .o. Prof. Dr. Jens Krugmann and MTA Andrea Struebl at the Institute of Pathology of the Medical University in Innsbruck. They might be contacted for further information under the following contact address: