Rifampicin resistance in Mycobacterium tuberculosis in Iran: a two-centre study

F Bahraminia; M Zangiabadian; M J Nasiri; M Fattahi; M Goudarzi; R Ranjbar; A A Imani Fooladi

doi:10.1016/j.nmni.2021.100909

Rifampicin resistance in Mycobacterium tuberculosis in Iran: a two-centre study

New Microbes New Infect. 2021 Jun 23:42:100909. doi: 10.1016/j.nmni.2021.100909. eCollection 2021 Jul.

Authors

F Bahraminia¹, M Zangiabadian², M J Nasiri³, M Fattahi⁴, M Goudarzi³, R Ranjbar⁵, A A Imani Fooladi¹

Affiliations

¹ Applied Microbiology Research Center, Systems Biology and Poisonings Institute, Baqiyatallah University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
² Student Research Committee, School of Medicine, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
³ Department of Microbiology, School of Medicine, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
⁴ Regional Tuberculosis Reference Laboratory, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
⁵ Molecular Biology Research Center, Baqiyatallah University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.

Abstract

Multidrug-resistant tuberculosis remains a challenge. In this study, we investigated the incidence of rifampicin (RIF) resistance in Mycobacterium tuberculosis in a large number of pulmonary specimens. A two-center study in Tehran, the capital of Iran, was performed with 6624 pulmonary samples of patients with tuberculosis (TB) who were subjected to detection of RIF-resistant TB by GeneXpert MTB/RIF assay between May 2014 and July 2018. Conventional drug susceptibility testing was performed to confirm the results. Xpert MTB/RIF identified a total of 96 positives for M. tuberculosis, of which 5 (5.3%) samples were found to be RIF-resistant TB. All RIF-resistant and sensitive isolates detected by GeneXpert were phenotypically confirmed by drug susceptibility testing. These results indicated that the Xpert MTB/RIF test can be used as a rapid diagnostic method and can potentially decrease the morbidity associated with diagnostic delay and mistreatment.

Keywords: Drug resistance; Xpert MTB/RIF; rifampicin; tuberculosis.