Publications
Multidrug-resistant patients receiving treatment in Niger who are infected with M. tuberculosis Cameroon family convert faster in smear and culture than those with M. tuberculosis Ghana family University of Antwerp Institute of Tropical Medicine
Transcriptional adaptation of drug-tolerant Mycobacterium tuberculosis during treatment of human tuberculosis Institute of Tropical Medicine
BACKGROUND:  Treatment initiation rapidly kills most drug-susceptible Mycobacterium tuberculosis, but a bacterial subpopulation tolerates prolonged drug exposure. We evaluated drug-tolerant bacilli in human sputum by comparing messenger RNA (mRNA) expression of drug-tolerant bacilli that survive the early bactericidal phase with treatment-naive bacilli.
METHODS:  M. tuberculosis gene expression was quantified via reverse-transcription ...
Molecular epidemiology and population structure of Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex strains in tuberculosis patients: implications for diagnostic approaches Institute of Tropical Medicine
Half of rifampicin-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex isolated from tuberculosis patients in Sub-Saharan Africa have concomitant resistance to pyrazinamide Institute of Tropical Medicine University of Antwerp
Background
Besides inclusion in 1st line regimens against tuberculosis (TB), pyrazinamide (PZA) is used in 2nd line anti-TB regimens, including in the short regimen for multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) patients. Guidelines and expert opinions are contradictory about inclusion of PZA in case of resistance. Moreover, drug susceptibility testing (DST) for PZA is not often applied in routine testing, and the prevalence of resistance is ...