Pneumonia: ... and to tuberculosis as differential diagnosis in community acquired pneumonia

doi:10.1136/bmj.332.7551.1214-a

BMJ 2006;332:1214 (20 May), doi:10.1136/bmj.332.7551.1214-a

Letter

Pneumonia

... and to tuberculosis as differential diagnosis in community acquired pneumonia

The first 100% of the full text of this article appears below.

EDITOR—One more disease should be added to the differentialdiagnosis of community acquired pneumonia:¹ pulmonary tuberculosis.Active tuberculosis often presents clinical features on radiologythat are indistinguishable from those of pneumonia.² Patientswith active tuberculosis are not rare in community settings.

Many people worldwide have latent tuberculosis, with the potentialof reactivation,³ and those who were born in an area where tuberculosisis endemic have increased incidences of active tuberculosis.⁴Warnings have been issued about a resurgence of active tuberculosisamong people infected with HIV.⁵

Patients with active tuberculosis should be managed promptlyand treated appropriately. Tuberculosis should always be bornein mind when seeing patients with signs suggestive of communityacquired pneumonia, and active diagnostic procedures such assputum examination are encouraged whenever the disease cannotbe ruled out.

Takeharu Koga, associate professor

kogat@med.kurume-u.ac.jp, Kurume University School of Medicine, Department of Internal Medicine, Kurume, 830-0011 Japan

Hisamichi Aizawa, professor

Kurume University School of Medicine, Department of Internal Medicine, Kurume, 830-0011 Japan

Competing interests: None declared.

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