Includes abstract.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 127-145).Smear microscopy has a poor sensitivity, cannot identify drug resistance, and when followed up with culture tests it takes several weeks to obtain a result. Furthermore, sputum-scarce and smear negative tuberculosis is difficult to diagnose. The use of biological samples other than sputum such as blood, urine and bronchoalveolar lavage fluid, are thus increasingly being used for diagnostic purposes. However, there is a low yield of rapid diagnostic tools, and the use of recently released commercially available technologies for tuberculosis diagnosis requires clarification
