Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2024 Dec 18;24(1):611.
doi: 10.1186/s12890-024-03427-6.

Clinical features of Tibetan adolescent tuberculosis at high altitudes: a retrospective study

Min Shen  1 , Wen Luo  1 , Banjiu Luobu  2 , Yirong Chen  3 , Peiyan Zhang  1 , Ruisi Qiu  4 , Xuerong Chen  1 , Weiping Guo  5   6 , Peifen Chen  7   8
Affiliations

Clinical features of Tibetan adolescent tuberculosis at high altitudes: a retrospective study

Min Shen et al. BMC Pulm Med. .

Abstract

Background: Adolescent pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) is considered inadequately recognized and underreported at high altitudes. This study aimed to investigate the clinical features of adolescent pulmonary TB patients at high altitudes in China.

Method: A retrospective analysis was performed at Linzhi People's Hospital. Patients recruited were newly diagnosed with pulmonary TB. Detailed information, including demographics, medical history, presenting symptoms, laboratory results and pulmonary images, was collected. Sputum samples were collected to detect Mycobacterium tuberculosis via the GeneXpert MTB/RIF assay.

Result: A total of 63 adolescents and 192 adults were recruited. Compared with those in the adult group, typical TB-related manifestations were significantly less common in the adolescent group (all P < 0.05). The adolescent group had significantly more subclinical TB (23.8% vs. 8.3%, P = 0.001) and a higher previous tuberculosis exposure rate (38.8% vs. 8.3%, P < 0.001) than did the adult group. The erythrocyte sedimentation rate was significantly higher in the adolescent group than in the adult group (P = 0.026). Compared with adult patients, adolescent patients presented a lower rate of pleural thickening (P < 0.01). Compared with active adolescent patients, there were more female than male in the adolescent subclinical TB group (12/15 vs 27/48) and the positive rate of the sputum GeneXpert test was higher in subclinical TB group (6/15 vs 8/48).

Conclusion: Adolescent patients with pulmonary TB at high altitudes were prone to subclinical TB and have a higher previous TB exposure rate. Sputum GeneXpert test and ESR were important for the diagnosis of subclinical pulmonary TB.

Keywords: Female; Subclinical tuberculosis; Tuberculosis exposure rate.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Declarations. Ethics approval and consent to participate: The study was designed in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration. The protocol and instruments were approved by the Ethics Committee of Linzhi People’s Hospital (LZRY.NO.20210315 [001]). As this was a retrospective study and the data were anonymous, the requirement for informed consent was therefore waived. Consent for publication: Not applicable. Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests.

References

    1. Chiang SS, Jenkins HE. Shedding light on tuberculosis deaths in children and adolescents. Pediatrics. 2021;147(4):e2020039404. - PMC - PubMed
    1. World Health Organization. Global Accelerated Action for the Health of Adolescents (AA-HA!): guidance to support country implementation. Geneva: WHO; 2017.
    1. Snow KJ, Cruz AT, Seddon JA, Ferrand RA, Chiang SS, Hughes JA, et al. Adolescent tuberculosis. Lancet Child Adolesc Health. 2020;4(1):68–79. - PMC - PubMed
    1. World Health Organization. Global tuberculosis report 2021. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2021.
    1. Carril SS, Neyro SE, Pena Amaya P, Vazquez M, Squassi IR, López EL. Adolescent tuberculosis: 6 years of experience in a tertiary care pediatric hospital in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Pediatr Infect Dis J. 2024;43(2):97–100. - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources