Evaluation of the new, easy to perform, IS6110 based molecular assay Speed-oligo® Direct MTB (Vircell, Spain) for the detection of M. tuberculosis and direct comparison to probeTe…

Background: “Speed-oligo® direct mycobacterium tuberculosis” (SPO DMTB) from Vircell is a novel assay, based on multiplex PCR dipstick hybridisation detecting Mycobacterium spp. and Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex (MTBC) in respiratory specimens. The amplification targets are: IS6110 (MTBC-specific), 16S rRNA (Mycobacterium genus-specific), and human gene RNAsaP (amplification control). Several authors consider IS6110-PCR as the most sensitive assay for direct detection of tuberculous bacteria in clinical specimens. We compare the IS6110 based SPO DMTB assay with ProbeTecTM MTBC (Becton Dickinson), another as…