Interferon-Inducible Protein-10 as a Marker to Detect Latent Tuberculosis Infection in Patients with Inflammatory...

Area of Science:

• Immunology
• Infectious Diseases
• Rheumatology

Background:

• Latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) poses a risk for tuberculosis (TB) reactivation, particularly in patients with inflammatory rheumatic diseases (IRD).
• Accurate detection of LTBI is essential for timely intervention and prevention of TB progression in this vulnerable population.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the diagnostic performance of interferon-gamma-inducible protein 10 (IP-10) as a biomarker for detecting LTBI.
• To compare the efficacy of IP-10 with established methods like the tuberculin skin test (TST) and QuantiFERON-TB Gold In-Tube test (QFT-GIT) in IRD patients.

Main Methods:

• Prospective study involving 76 patients with IRD, excluding those with a history of TB or active TB.
• Measurement of IP-10 levels, alongside performance of TST and QFT-GIT in all participants.
• Analysis of complete test results from 70 patients to determine LTBI prevalence and biomarker performance.

Main Results:

• Latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) was identified in 30% (21/70) of the patients based on QFT-GIT results.
• Interferon-gamma-inducible protein 10 (IP-10) demonstrated high diagnostic accuracy with 91% sensitivity and 89% specificity at a cut-off of 2197 pg/mL (AUC: 0.950).
• Good agreement was observed between QFT-GIT and IP-10 (84.3%), while agreement with TST was poor.

Conclusions:

• Released IP-10 is a sensitive and specific biomarker for detecting latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) in patients with inflammatory rheumatic diseases (IRD).
• IP-10 exhibits comparable performance to the QFT-GIT assay, offering a potential alternative or complementary diagnostic tool for LTBI screening in this population.