What is it about?
Cystic fibrosis is a genetic condition that causes progressive loss of the capacity to breathe. Besides, people living with cystic fibrosis have an increased lifetime risk of infection by otherwise harmful microorganisms that live in the environment. One of these environmental bacteria, nontuberculous mycobacteria (NTM), can affect individuals with cystic fibrosis and accelerate their respiratory compromise. However, the exact percentage of people with cystic fibrosis affected by NTM worldwide is unknown. In this study, we reviewed and analyzed all published and unpublished scientific information about reporting the presence of NTM in the respiratory tract of patients with cystic fibrosis. Based on worldwide available data, we calculated that around 8% of the people living with cystic fibrosis are affected by NTM in a given year. We were not able to estimate the number of new infections per year due to a lack of available data.
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Why is it important?
Our study is a comprehensive analysis of the global epidemiology of infections with nontuberculous mycobacteria (NTM) in people with cystic fibrosis. Furthermore, we summarize all available data about the burden of NTM pulmonary disease in cystic fibrosis. Despite the comprehensive searches and inclusion of grey literature sources, we found limited data about the incidence (new cases) of NTM infection and NTM pulmonary disease. Overall, our study will help researchers to plan clinical studies based on the estimates of NTM infection in their population. It also highlights current gaps in knowledge and the need to harmonize reporting of results to facilitate secondary data analysis.
Perspectives
One of the main obstacles to analyzing this epidemiological data was the lack of standardized reporting in observational studies and prospective cystic fibrosis registries. We found limited reporting of microbiological methods and descriptions of clinical populations. Thus, it is imperative to harmonize data definitions and establish a minimum set of reportable metadata to facilitate international collaboration.
Miguel Prieto
Simon Fraser University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Global burden of non-tuberculous mycobacteria in the cystic fibrosis population: a systematic review and meta-analysis, ERJ Open Research, September 2022, European Respiratory Society (ERS),
DOI: 10.1183/23120541.00336-2022.
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