Cases of pulmonary infection caused by Mycobacterium kansasii (Mk) in our hospitallocated at the midnorthern area of the Kyushu district, which is in the southern part of Fukuoka prefecture were evaluated.
Mk infection is not so rare in other areas of Japan, such as Tokyo and Kinki district, however, there has been no published report on the disease from the Kyushu district.Therefore, the frequency and the clinical features of our cases of Mk infection were analyzed.
During 17 years from 1982 to 1998, there were 14 patients of Mk infection out of 241 nontuberculous mycobacteriosis (NTM). There were 595 patients of culturepositive pulmonary tuberculosis without prior treatment (Tbc). The proportion of Mk/Tbc was 2.4% and that of Mk/NTM was 5.8 %.
During the period A (from 1982 to 1994) the ratio of Mk/Tbc was 5/462 (1.1%), while on the other side that of Mk/Tbc during the period B (from 1995 to 1998), it was 9/133 (6.8%), which was significantly (P<0.01) higher compared with that in the period A.
Although the patients of Mk infection in our hospital had been rare until 1994, from the results mentioned above, it was considered that the frequency of Mk infection in our hospital has increased to some extent since 1995.
One of the characteristics in our cases was that the ratio of female (42.9%) was rela tively high.
All the female patients were considered to be compromised hosts.
The results of the drug resistance tests were consistent with the other reports in our country.
By the combination treatment including rifampicin as the major drug, the negative conversion of culture were obtained within 2 months in all our cases.
