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To overcome the shortcomings of the classical methods employed for diagnosis
of tuberculosis, a new, faster, highly specific and sensitive diagnostic
kit for the disease was launched here on Friday.
“The product - Fast Plaque TB - is developed by Biotech Laboratories
Ltd, a UK based company and would be marketed in India by Medispan Ltd,”
S.L. Mukherji, president of Medispan Ltd, a Chennai based company engaged
in the business of manufacturing and marketing pharmaceutical told reporters.
“The current methodologies for detecting TB - smear microscopy, chest
X-Ray, PCR (molecular method) and culture method - suffer from some drawback,”
head of the diagnostic division of medispan, B.J. Desai said.
Smear microscopy has a lower sensitivity and is labour intensive, Desai
revealed, adding chest X-Ray was prone to misinterpretation while PCR
was highly expensive as it involved specialised equipment and trained
individuals.
“Culture method, which is the gold standard for diagnosing TB, takes
a lot of time (6-14 weeks) and may be hazardous to lab personnel,”
he said. The new system does away with all these difficulties, he added.
“The kit, a product of biotechnology research, detects TB within
48 hours. It is highly specific and chances of false positives are rare,
besides its high sensitivity enables it to diagnose the disease even when
the level of bacteria is as low as 100-300 cells per millilitre,”
Desai said.
He added that the kit had been validated in several countries across the
globe and has received marketing permission from the Drug Controller General
of India.
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