Quantcast
ZME Science
  • CoronavirusNEW
  • News
  • Environment
    • Climate
    • Animals
    • Renewable Energy
    • Eco tips
    • Environmental Issues
    • Green Living
  • Health
    • Alternative Medicine
    • Anatomy
    • Diseases
    • Genetics
    • Mind & Brain
    • Nutrition
  • Future
  • Space
  • Feature
    • Feature Post
    • Art
    • Great Pics
    • Design
    • Fossil Friday
    • AstroPicture
    • GeoPicture
    • Did you know?
    • Offbeat
  • More
    • About
    • The Team
    • Advertise
    • Contribute
    • Our stance on climate change
    • Privacy Policy
    • Contact
No Result
View All Result
ZME Science

No Result
View All Result
ZME Science
No Result
View All Result
Home Health & Medicine Diseases

Rats successfully sniff out tuberculosis in children

The rats are much more efficient than the conventional test.

Mihai Andrei by Mihai Andrei
April 12, 2018
in Diseases, Health & Medicine, News

In a new study, researchers show that rats can be trained to detect tuberculosis (TB) in children — and they have a higher accuracy rate than the basic microscopy test.

Several species of African pouched rats have been trained to sniff out TB or landmines.

The study was inspired by anecdotal evidence that people suffering from TB have a very slight, distinctive odor. The disease is caused by a bacteria called Mycobacterium tuberculosis. The bacteria usually attack the lungs, spreading through the air when a person with TB coughs, sneezes, or talks — so it makes sense that the process might come with a particular scent.

Unfortunately, methods for detecting TB are far from perfect, especially in impoverished areas like sub-Saharan Africa and South-East Asia, which are often most at risk of contagion and where the disease is quite prevalent. In these areas, a cheap smear test is commonly used.

ADVERTISEMENT

The test relies on analyzing a sample of sputum — the yucky mixture of saliva and mucus coughed up from the respiratory tract. The accuracy of the test greatly relies on the quality of sputum sample used. Quite often (and this is especially true for young children), patients are unable to produce a good enough sample and therefore their TB might go undetected.

Lead author Georgies Mgode of the Sokoine University of Agriculture in Tanzania comments:

“As a result, many children with TB are not bacteriologically confirmed or even diagnosed, which then has major implications for their possible successful treatment,” he explained. “There is a need for new diagnostic tests to better detect TB in children, especially in low and middle-income countries.”

Mgode and his colleagues have previously worked on training African giant pouched rats (Cricetomys ansorgei) to pick up the scent of molecules released by the TB-causing bacterium. Now, they’ve compared the rats’ detection work with existing diagnosis methods.

ADVERTISEMENT
Get more science news like this...

Join the ZME newsletter for amazing science news, features, and exclusive scoops. More than 40,000 subscribers can't be wrong.

   

They obtained sputum samples from 982 children under the age of five who had already been tested using a microscopy test at clinics in the Tanzanian capital of Dar es Salaam. From the smear test, 34 of them were found to have TB, but the rats identified a further 57 cases which were confirmed by a more complex analysis method (the light emitting diode fluorescence microscope). In other words, rats successfully found 68% more cases of TB infection

“This intervention involving TB screening by trained rats and community based patient tracking of new TB patients missed by hospitals enables treatment initiation of up to 70%. This is a significant proportion given that these additional patients were considered TB negative in hospitals, hence were initially left untreated,” adds Mgode.

The news has already been passed to relevant clinics, and plans are underway for a broader detection campaign. The infected children in the study have been contacted for treatment.

The same type of rats has also been used to sniff out landmines.

Journal Reference: Mgode, G.F. et al. Pediatric tuberculosis detection using trained African giant pouched rats. DOI:10.1038/pr.2018.40

Tags: giant African pouched ratrattuberculosis
Mihai Andrei

Mihai Andrei

Andrei's background is in geophysics, and he's been fascinated by it ever since he was a child. Feeling that there is a gap between scientists and the general audience, he started ZME Science -- and the results are what you see today.

Follow ZME on social media

ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
  • Coronavirus
  • News
  • Environment
  • Health
  • Future
  • Space
  • Feature
  • More

© 2007-2019 ZME Science - Not exactly rocket science. All Rights Reserved.

No Result
View All Result
  • Coronavirus
  • News
  • Environment
    • Climate
    • Animals
    • Renewable Energy
    • Eco tips
    • Environmental Issues
    • Green Living
  • Health
    • Alternative Medicine
    • Anatomy
    • Diseases
    • Genetics
    • Mind & Brain
    • Nutrition
  • Future
  • Space
  • Feature
    • Feature Post
    • Art
    • Great Pics
    • Design
    • Fossil Friday
    • AstroPicture
    • GeoPicture
    • Did you know?
    • Offbeat
  • More
    • About
    • The Team
    • Advertise
    • Contribute
    • Our stance on climate change
    • Privacy Policy
    • Contact

© 2007-2019 ZME Science - Not exactly rocket science. All Rights Reserved.