We keep some back issues on this site and have a list of available releases . In a separate article, Theresa M. Michele, M.D., of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, Md., and colleagues provide evidence that TB was transmitted from one person to another via a contaminated bronchoscope at an unidentified hospital.
Bronchoscopes are instruments used to examine the lung's airways.
Bronchoscopies occasionally are performed to confirm the diagnosis of TB, which is usually passed in airborne droplets produced by coughing or sneezing. The researchers were able to link the spread of TB through dirty bronchoscopes by using DNA fingerprinting and extensive epidemiological investigations. Both studies found that hospitals failed to adequately clean and disinfect used bronchoscopes, according to nationally established guidelines. TB was spread from one infected patient to other patients who subsequently underwent bronchoscopies with the same instrument. Agerton and colleagues found that five of the eight people with a rare, drug-resistant strain of TB in South Carolina in early 1995 were family members or a close friend, confirming close contact and normal transmittal by air.