Evidence map›Paper›PMID 39779565›Full record

ArticleCurrent pediatric reviews2026

GeneXpert MTB/RIF Ultra in Pediatric Tuberculosis: How Disease Characteristics Modify Test Performances.

Domenico Pace, Roberta Pellegrino, Irene Dalpiaz, Marco Renni, Luisa Galli, Elena Chiappini

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Article in Current pediatric reviews, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.

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1 · What the graph read from it

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2 · The registry

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3 · Its place in the literature

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4 · The record

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5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

6 authors.

Domenico PaceDepartment of Health Sciences, University of Florence, Florence, Italy.ORCID 0009-0002-7778-7166
Roberta PellegrinoDepartment of Health Sciences, University of Florence, Florence, Italy.ORCID 0000-0001-6454-9383
Irene DalpiazDepartment of Health Sciences, University of Florence, Florence, Italy.
Marco RenniDepartment of Health Sciences, University of Florence, Florence, Italy.ORCID 0009-0007-7946-5829
Luisa GalliDepartment of Health Sciences, University of Florence, Florence, Italy.
Elena ChiappiniDepartment of Health Sciences, University of Florence, Florence, Italy.ORCID 0000-0002-1476-4752

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

introductionThe diagnosis of pediatric tuberculosis (TB) is challenging, due to the lower sensitivity of microbiological tests, such as culture and microscopy, compared to their performance in adult cases. Guidelines have introduced molecular tests, including GeneXpert MTB/ RIF and GeneXpert MTB/RIF Ultra. These tests use a real-time polymerase chain reaction method and provide information on M. tuberculosis detection and drug-resistance-associated mutations in less than 2 hours. This retrospective single-center study aimed to evaluate the accuracy of GeneXpert and GeneXpert Ultra for the diagnosis of pediatric TB.

methodsThis retrospective study was conducted on a total of 95 children diagnosed with probable or confirmed TB disease (74 diagnosed with pulmonary TB, 21 with extrapulmonary TB), who referred to the infectious disease unit at Meyer Children's Hospital in Florence, Italy, and tested with GeneXpert MTB/RIF or GeneXpert Ultra, from 2013 to 2023.

resultsGeneXpert and GeneXpert Ultra demonstrated a detection rate of 0.357 (95% CI 0.180 to 0.535) and 0.537 (95% CI 0.417-0.657), respectively. No child was tested with both tests. Patients' characteristics, including age and sex, did not significantly influence the test's performances. Notably, GeneXpert Ultra had a significantly higher detection rate in children with extrapulmonary TB (0.813, 95% CI 0.621 to 1.004) compared to that in children with pulmonary TB (p = 0.020). Gastric aspirate was the most tested specimen. Specimens that did not require invasive procedures for collection (including stool) yielded poor results. GeneXpert and GeneXpert Ultra permitted rapid evaluation of genotypic drug-sensitivity testing (DST), even though limited to rifampicin resistance, making necessary confirmation through phenotypic DST (performed on culture).

conclusionThe introduction of GeneXpert and GeneXpert Ultra improved TB diagnosis in children, by providing microbiological information in a short time, complementing results from culture, which remains the reference test in pediatric TB diagnosis.

Indexed as

Mycobacterium tuberculosisReal-Time Polymerase Chain ReactionTuberculosisTuberculosis, PulmonaryAdolescentChildChild, PreschoolDrug Resistance, BacterialFemaleHumansInfantMaleRetrospective StudiesSensitivity and SpecificityTuberculosis, ExtrapulmonaryChildrendiagnosisGeneXpert Ultrasensitivityspecimentuberculosis

Identifiers

PMID39779565
PMCPMC13555767

What Socratic holds

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.