Abstract

The main reason for this high mortality is the lack of proper diagnosis at the right time. This
is particularly important in patients with HIV and TB co-infection; especially with extra
pulmonary TB as the detection rates are low. There is an urgent need to implement newer
diagnostic modalities for the detection of TB especially in highly HIV prevalent areas.
Patients satisfying inclusion criteria i.e. HIV positive patients clinically and/or radiologically
suspected of pulmonary tuberculosis whose sputum AFB is reported negative were subjected
for CBNAAT. This was done with the intention of identifying yield of CBNAAT over
microscopy. Among patients with abnormal chest x-ray, 84.6% had positive CBNAAT while
in those with normal chest X-ray, 81.1% had negative CBNAAT. Hence majority of patients
with abnormal chest X-ray findings had positive CBNAAT while majority of those with
normal chest x-ray had negative CBNAAT.