Abstract
Tosoh TRCReady MTB/MAC (TRCReady) is a new automatic acid-fast bacterium detection method using a transcription reverse-transcription concerted reaction. We tested the performance of the TRCReady assay by comparing with that of Roche Cobas TaqMan using polymerase chain reaction (PCR) with clinical samples. As for the result of 135 clinical samples in which the detection of MTB was targeted, the rate of concordance between TRCReady and culture was 95% (sensitivity, 90%; specificity, 98%), and that between PCR and culture was 94% (sensitivity, 88%; specificity, 98%). For the 107 clinical samples in which the detection of MAC was targeted, the rate of concordance between TRCReady and culture was 96% (sensitivity, 97%; specificity, 95%), and that between PCR and culture was 97% (sensitivity, 98%; specificity, 95%). With all samples, the internal control of TRCReady and PCR became positive. It takes only 40 min for detection using TRCReady after the NALC-NaOH processing, whereas it takes more than 210 min using Cobas TaqMan. These results indicate that TRCReady is useful for the rapid diagnosis of tuberculosis and pulmonary MAC disease.
