The T-SPOT.TB Test for Diagnosis of Breast Tuberculosis.

Objective: To assess the diagnostic value of the T-SPOT.TB test in cases of breast turberculosis (BTB) in China.

Methods: We enrolled 13 female patients with primary BTB as the BTB test group and 10 healthy volunteers as the control group. The 2 groups underwent T-SPOT.TB tests and tuberculin skin tests (TSTs) before receiving a core-needle biopsy or excision biopsy. We then collected and analyzed T-SPOT.TB and TST data.

Results: The sensitivity of the T-SPOT.TB test for detection of BTB (84.6%) was significantly greater than that of TST (53.8%) (P <.05); the specificity of each test (80.0% and 60.0%, respectively) for BTB was not significantly different (P >.05).

Conclusion: The T-SPOT.TB test could be a useful adjunct to current tests for diagnosis of BTB and could be used for early diagnosis of this condition.