Characteristics of persons Sex Male Female Age 15-24 25-34 35-44 > = 45 Occupation Farmer Non-farmer Monthly income <=400 birr (<=34 USD) >400 birr (>34 USD) Yes No Yes No Yes No Contact with cattle Drink uncooked milk Contact with a chronic cougher 4 (16.7) 12 (19.0) 3 (18.8) 5 (16.7) 4 (14.3) 4 (30.8) 11 (19.6) 5 (16.1) 10 (21.3) 1 (16.7) 4 (50.0) 12 (15.2) 6 (19.4) 10 (17.9) 10 (21.3) 6 (15.0) 20 (83.3) 51 (81.0) 13 (81.2) 25 (83.3) 24 (85.7) 9 (69.2) 45 (80.4) 26 (83.9) 37 (78.7) 5 (83.3) 4 (50.0) 67 (84.8) 25 (80.6) 46 (82.10) 37 (78.7) 34 (85.0) 1.18 [0.34-4.1] 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0.87 [0.18-4.21] 0.72 [0.14-3.73] 1.93 [0.34-10.77] 0.69 [0.40- 4.06] 1.35 [0.14- 12.92] 5.58 [1.23- 25.43]* 1.10 [0.36- 3.39] 1.53 [0.50- 4.67] Page 5 of 7 OR [95% CI] 2.28 [0.71- 7.36] 2.28 [0.37- 14.0] 0.98 [0.19- 5.07] 1.80 [0.30- 11.0] 2.40 [0.72- 8.0] 2.48 [0.30- 11.0] 0.23 [0.03- 1.87] 1.66 [0.38- 7.19] 0.55 [0.06- 4.84] 5.46 [1.69- 7.61]* 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 Abebe et al. BMC Public Health 2012, 12:504 http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2458/12/504 Table 3 Characteristics of persons with tuberculous and non-tuberculous lymphadenitis, Gilgel Gibe, southwest Ethiopia TB status OR [95% CI] Positive n (%) Negative n (%) strengthened. It is logical that the health care seeking behavior could be low for TB lymphadenitis compared with that of pulmonary TB. This is mainly because pul- monary TB has a higher case fatality rate than TB lymphadenitis and the latter is mainly of cosmetic con- cern at least initially, which takes lower priority in rural communities with poor access to health facilities. Never- theless, the health extension workers should be trained to identify not only pulmonary but also extrapulmonary Table 4 Characteristics of the lymph nodes in persons with tuberculous and non-tuberculous lymphadenitis, Gilgel Gibe, southwest Ethiopia Characteristic of the TB status lymph node Positive n (%) Negative n (%) OR Odds ratio, CI Confidence interval, USD United Sates Dollar, *p < 0.05. accounted for 43.2% (95%CI: 28.7-59.1) of all forms of TB diagnosed in the study setting. A previous report from Ethiopia also indicated that TB lymphadenitis accounted for 40% of total TB cases in a rural health center [13]. WHO estimates for Ethiopia that extrapul- monary TB accounts for roughly one third of the new cases of TB in the country [5]. However, it is not pos- sible to compare the findings from our study with the national figure of the WHO estimates because of two main reasons. First, the WHO data were derived from health institution based reports. Second, our study did not investigate all forms of extrapulmonary TB. Investi- gating the different parameters to identify risk factors for TB lymphadenitis in areas of high and low propor- tions in the country is recommended. It has been reported that TB case detection remains very low in Ethiopia [14]. Indeed, in our study all the TB lymphadenitis cases were newly diagnosed. The efforts to improve TB case detection in the country should be Lymph node involved Cervical Axiliary Inguinal Others Nature of FNA specimen Caseous Non-caseous OR Odds ratio, CI Confidence interval, *p < 0.05. Number of lymph nodes Duration <=6 weeks 7-12 weeks >12 weeks Tenderness Tender Non-tender Single Few Multiple Size 1-4 cm 5-10 cm Mobility Mobile Non-mobile Condition Soft Firm Matted Draining sinus Fluctuant 8 (25.0) 2 (25.0) 6 (12.8) 2 (18.2) 14 (18.4) 5 (12.2) 2 (20.0) 9 (25.0) 11 (15.5) 5 (31.2) 15 (21.4) 1 (5.9) 4 (17.4) 10 (16.9) 2 (66.7) 0 (0.0) 0 (0.0) 12 (18.5) 3 (27.3) 1 (11.1) 0 (0.0) 8 (42.1) 8 (11.8) 24 (75.0) 6 (75.0) 41 (87.2) 9 (81.8) 62 (81.6) 36 (87.80) 8 (80.0) 27 (75.0) 60 (84.5) 11 (68.8) 55 (78.6) 16 (94.1) 19 (82.6) 49 (83.1) 1 (33.3) 1 (100.0) 1 (100.0) 53 (81.5) 8 (72.7) 8 (88.9) 2 (100.0) 11 (57.9) 60 (88.2)