Browsing by Author "Jugheli, Levan"

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    Direct susceptibility testing of Mycobacterium tuberculosis for Pyrazinamide by Use of the Bactec MGIT 960 system
    (American Society for Microbiology, 2016-05) Demers, Anne-Marie; Venter, Amour; Friedrich, Sven O.; Rojas-Ponce, Gabriel; Mapamba, Daniel; Jugheli, Levan; Sasamalo, Mohammed; Almeida, Deepak; Dorasamy, Afton; Jentsch, Ute; Gibson, Mara; Everitt, Daniel; Eisenach, Kathleen D.; Diacon, Andreas H.
    Pyrazinamide (PZA) is a key antituberculosis drug, yet no rapid susceptibility test is commercially available. PZA drug susceptibility testing (DST) was performed directly on sputum samples from 327 patients and compared with the indirect method by using the Bactec MGIT 960 system in the context of patient screening for participation in a drug trial. Compared to standard indirect PZA DST, direct DST was successful in only 59% of cases, but results obtained were highly accurate and available faster. Agreement between the direct and indirect methods varied from 90 to 100% in each laboratory. The median times for obtaining PZA results from the time when the specimen was collected ranged from 11 to 16 days for the direct test and 18 to 95 days for the indirect test across laboratories. The direct method is accurate and reproducible across laboratories. It can be expected to accelerate results in >50% of cases, but it cannot replace indirect DST for PZA. Phenotypic methods remain the gold standard for DST in drug trials. If future studies can optimize the method to decrease the number of uninterpretable results, direct MGIT DST could be the new phenotypic DST standard for clinical trials, providing more rapid detection of resistance to new drugs in experimental regimens.
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    Multiple introductions of mycobacterium tuberculosis lineage 2–Beijing into Africa over centuries
    (Frontiers Media, 2019) Rutaihwa, Liliana K.; Menardo, Fabrizio; Stucki, David; Gygli, Sebastian M.; Ley, Serej D.; Malla, Bijaya; Feldmann, Julia; Borrell, Sonia; Beisel, Christian; Middelkoop, Kerren; Carter, E. Jane; Diero, Lameck; Ballif, Marie; Jugheli, Levan; Reither, Klaus; Fenner, Lukas; Brites, Daniela; Gagneux, Sebastien
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The Lineage 2–Beijing (L2–Beijing) sub-lineage of Mycobacterium tuberculosis has received much attention due to its high virulence, fast disease progression, and association with antibiotic resistance. Despite several reports of the recent emergence of L2–Beijing in Africa, no study has investigated the evolutionary history of this sub-lineage on the continent. In this study, we used whole genome sequences of 781 L2 clinical strains from 14 geographical regions globally distributed to investigate the origins and onward spread of this lineage in Africa. Our results reveal multiple introductions of L2–Beijing into Africa linked to independent bacterial populations from East- and Southeast Asia. Bayesian analyses further indicate that these introductions occurred during the past 300 years, with most of these events pre-dating the antibiotic era. Hence, the success of L2–Beijing in Africa is most likely due to its hypervirulence and high transmissibility rather than drug resistance.