Implementation status of rifampicin resistance gene testing in our hospital: Evaluation of tuberculosis rifampicin resistance gene identification kit “Jenosu color^®·Rif TB”

Abstract

Drug susceptibility testing is extremely important in tuberculosis (TB) treatment but it takes a long time to produce results, which is a disadvantage. Thus, new rapid drug susceptibility testing methods based on genetic diagnosis have been developed one after another. In this work, we introduce “Jenosu color^® · Rif TB” (NIPRO Co., Ltd.) and examined its utility for detecting the RFP resistance gene directly using this material. The detection rates of TB using this kit were 98% in smear-positive specimens and 78.8% when using materials other than sputum or culture. We determined the presence of the RFP resistance gene and the matching rates of drug susceptibility testing; the sensitivity matching rate was 100% and the resistance matching rate was 82.5%. The results of this study reveal that this kit is useful in the presence or absence of the effect of RFP administration, for changing the method of treatment, and for the prevention of nosocomial infection. It is considered to contribute to the treatment of TB.