Recently, the World Health Organization placed Tuberculosis (TB) on the list of top 10 causes of death globally.
Although curable, TB is a deadly bacterial infection that can be difficult to diagnose. If left untreated, a person with active TB only has a 50 percent chance of survival.
Jeffrey D. Cirillo, Ph.D, a professor in the Texas A&M College of Medicine, has developed a test for TB called TB REaD.
The test can be completed in less than 10 minutes. Studies have shown the test can catch 80 percent of cases that would have otherwise been missed using normal tests.
According to the Texas A&M University Health Science Center, Cirillo also has a new approach that can detect TB without sputum samples - a quality especially important for detecting the disease in children who are often unable to produce enough sputum for the standard test.
Cirillo along with Texas A&M biomedical engineers continue developing new systems to detect drug resistance.
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