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Results of five-year systematic screening for latent tuberculosis infection in healthcare workers in Portugal

INTRODUCTION: The risk of tuberculosis (TB) in healthcare workers (HCWs) is related to its incidence in the general population, and increased by the specific risk as a professional group. The prevalence of latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) in HCWs in Portugal using the tuberculin skin test (TST)...

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Autores principales: Torres Costa, José, Silva, Rui, Sá, Raul, Cardoso, Maria João, Nienhaus, Albert
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2010
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2921383/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20659314
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1745-6673-5-22
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author Torres Costa, José
Silva, Rui
Sá, Raul
Cardoso, Maria João
Nienhaus, Albert
author_facet Torres Costa, José
Silva, Rui
Sá, Raul
Cardoso, Maria João
Nienhaus, Albert
author_sort Torres Costa, José
collection PubMed
description INTRODUCTION: The risk of tuberculosis (TB) in healthcare workers (HCWs) is related to its incidence in the general population, and increased by the specific risk as a professional group. The prevalence of latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) in HCWs in Portugal using the tuberculin skin test (TST) and the interferon-γ release assays (IGRA) was analyzed over a five-year period. METHODS: A screening programme for LTBI in HCWs was conducted, with clinical evaluations, TST, IGRA, and chest radiography. Putative risk factors for LTBI were assessed by a standardised questionnaire. RESULTS: Between September 2005 and June 2009, 5,414 HCWs were screened. The prevalence of LTBI was 55.2% and 25.9% using a TST ≥ 10 mm or an IGRA test result (QuantiFERON-TB Gold In-Tube) INF-γ ≥0.35 IU/mL as a criterion for LTBI, respectively. In 53 HCWs active TB was diagnosed. The number of HCWs with newly detected active TB decreased from 19 in the first year to 6 in 2008. Risk assessment was poorly related to TST diameter. However, physicians (1.7%) and nurses (1.0%) had the highest rates of active TB. CONCLUSIONS: LTBI and TB burden among HCWs in Portugal is high. The screening of these professionals to identify HCWs with LTBI is essential in order to offer preventive chemotherapy to those with a high risk of future progression to disease. Systematic screening had a positive impact on the rate of active TB in HCWs either by early case detection or by increasing the awareness of HCWs and therefore the precautions taken by them.
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spelling pubmed-29213832010-08-14 Results of five-year systematic screening for latent tuberculosis infection in healthcare workers in Portugal Torres Costa, José Silva, Rui Sá, Raul Cardoso, Maria João Nienhaus, Albert J Occup Med Toxicol Research INTRODUCTION: The risk of tuberculosis (TB) in healthcare workers (HCWs) is related to its incidence in the general population, and increased by the specific risk as a professional group. The prevalence of latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) in HCWs in Portugal using the tuberculin skin test (TST) and the interferon-γ release assays (IGRA) was analyzed over a five-year period. METHODS: A screening programme for LTBI in HCWs was conducted, with clinical evaluations, TST, IGRA, and chest radiography. Putative risk factors for LTBI were assessed by a standardised questionnaire. RESULTS: Between September 2005 and June 2009, 5,414 HCWs were screened. The prevalence of LTBI was 55.2% and 25.9% using a TST ≥ 10 mm or an IGRA test result (QuantiFERON-TB Gold In-Tube) INF-γ ≥0.35 IU/mL as a criterion for LTBI, respectively. In 53 HCWs active TB was diagnosed. The number of HCWs with newly detected active TB decreased from 19 in the first year to 6 in 2008. Risk assessment was poorly related to TST diameter. However, physicians (1.7%) and nurses (1.0%) had the highest rates of active TB. CONCLUSIONS: LTBI and TB burden among HCWs in Portugal is high. The screening of these professionals to identify HCWs with LTBI is essential in order to offer preventive chemotherapy to those with a high risk of future progression to disease. Systematic screening had a positive impact on the rate of active TB in HCWs either by early case detection or by increasing the awareness of HCWs and therefore the precautions taken by them. BioMed Central 2010-07-26 /pmc/articles/PMC2921383/ /pubmed/20659314 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1745-6673-5-22 Text en Copyright ©2010 Costa et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research
Torres Costa, José
Silva, Rui
Sá, Raul
Cardoso, Maria João
Nienhaus, Albert
Results of five-year systematic screening for latent tuberculosis infection in healthcare workers in Portugal
title Results of five-year systematic screening for latent tuberculosis infection in healthcare workers in Portugal
title_full Results of five-year systematic screening for latent tuberculosis infection in healthcare workers in Portugal
title_fullStr Results of five-year systematic screening for latent tuberculosis infection in healthcare workers in Portugal
title_full_unstemmed Results of five-year systematic screening for latent tuberculosis infection in healthcare workers in Portugal
title_short Results of five-year systematic screening for latent tuberculosis infection in healthcare workers in Portugal
title_sort results of five-year systematic screening for latent tuberculosis infection in healthcare workers in portugal
topic Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2921383/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20659314
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1745-6673-5-22
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