Articles on Medical Diseases and Conditions

Entries Tagged ‘Nucleic acid probe’

Hepatitis C virus (HCV)

After serologic tests for HAV and HBV were developed, apparent viral hepatitis nonreactive to tests for HAV and HBV or to other viruses that affect the liver was called non-A, non-B (NANB) hepatitis virus. Eventually, hepatitis D virus was discovered and separated from the NANB group. It was also known that NANB represented both a […]

Tuberculosis and Mycobacterial Disease

Tuberculosis is caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB), a rod-shaped bacterium that requires special media for culture and that has the peculiarity of “acid-fastness” (resistance to decolorization by strong acidic decolorizing chemicals such as acid alcohol after being stained by certain stains such as carbol fuchsin). Tuberculosis is still very important and common despite advances in […]

Direct Methods of Bacterial Detection

Culture. This is the classic definitive method for detection and identification and will be discussed later in more detail. The major drawback is time; it usually takes 1 full day to grow the organism and then part or all of 1 day to identify it. It may take an additional day to isolate it before […]