Full transcript
Lab
0:01[snorts]
0:08>> What's up Ninja Nerds? In this video
0:09today we're going to be talking about
0:10tuberculosis. And if you guys like this
0:11video, please support us. You can hit
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0:16or you can go to our website. On our
0:17website we got things like notes,
0:18illustrations, we got quizzes. Go check
0:20it out, there's a lot to learn. All
0:21right, let's get into TB. When we talk
0:23about TB, first thing we need to know is
Etiology of Tuberculosis (TB)
0:25what's the thing that's causing it? What
0:26is that particular pathogen? The
0:27particular pathogen is actually called a
0:29mycobacterium tuberculosis. That's
0:32really, really important to remember.
0:33So, the primary pathogen is called
0:36mycobacterium bacterium
0:39tuberculosis.
0:41Now, there's a lot of different types of
0:42mycobacterium species.
0:45But, mycobacterium tuberculosis is
0:46definitely
0:48it's a pretty scary one. When we talk
0:50about this one, what makes this one
0:51super unique is when you actually zoom
0:52in on its overall cell wall, there's a
0:54couple different components that are
0:55really critical. So, going from the most
0:57inner portion to the outer portion,
0:58there's a couple different layers. One
1:00here we have just the overall cell
1:02membrane.
1:03All right, that's kind of that just a
1:04phospholipid bilayer, if you will. Then
1:07after that, we have this peptidoglycan
1:09layer, all right? So, then we have
1:10something called a peptidoglycan
1:14layer.
1:16Then, there's technically a something
1:17called arabino
1:20galactan
1:22layer.
1:23And then the most important layer is
1:25called the mycolic acids. So, this is
1:27called mycolic
1:30acids. Now, the mycolic acids are
1:33probably the most important thing to
1:34remember. When we talk about this one,
1:36mycolic acids, really what's interesting
1:39about these
1:40is that they allow for mycobacterium to
1:43be
1:44I'd say whenever you're doing your
1:46special types of staining, so when you
1:47go through your different types of Gram
1:48staining procedures, you use things like
1:50crystal violet, you use things like
1:52carbolfuchsin, and generally what it's
1:53supposed to do is supposed to stain the
1:55bacteria kind of like a
1:57reddish pinkish color. And then what you
1:59do is you actually undergo a process
2:01where you kind of use this kind of acid
2:05alcohol to decolorize it and remove that
2:07dye out.
2:08What happens with mycolic acids is that
2:11they really resist that decolorization.
2:14And because they resist decolorization
2:16with what's called your acid-fast kind
2:19of like staining, which is again we use
2:21acid alcohol, they don't get that red
2:24color out. They remain kind of a Well,
2:26actually, they kind of retain this
2:28reddish color with a bluish background.
2:30And so, mycolic acids make these
2:33bacteria what we call acid-fast.
2:36All right? So, let's write that down.
2:38This makes it a acid-
2:41fast bacteria.
2:44And this is going to become pretty
2:45critical cuz when we actually start
2:46getting into um
2:49the actual testing process where we do
2:50something called acid-fast bacillus
2:51smears,
2:52one of the beautiful things about, you
2:54know, generally mycobacterial species is
2:57that when you again go through them, you
2:58give them this kind of reddish, pinkish
2:59dye, you give them an acid alcohol, and
3:02that should wash all of that off. Any
3:04kind of mycobacterial species exhibit a
3:06lot of these mycolic acids, and they
3:07resist that decolorization. So again,
3:09because of that, they stay. What does
3:11this mean when they're acid-fast?
3:13Is they stay red.
3:15So, let's actually write that out here.
3:17They remain
3:20red.
3:22And all that tells me is that there is
3:24the presence of mycobacterial species.
3:26Doesn't tell me if it's TB, it doesn't
3:28tell me if it's like ADM or any of these
3:29other different types. It just tells me,
3:30"Hey, there's a mycobacterium present."
3:32Now,
3:33one of the other really important things
3:34about mycobacterium
3:36is not only just its cell wall, which is
3:38rich in these mycolic acids. Mycolic
3:40acids makes it pretty, pretty hardy type
3:41of pathogen, but also it's got other
3:43unique characteristics. Naturally, what
3:45we look at with these bacteria is
3:47something called their doubling time.
3:49And we look at this logarithmic scale,
3:50which looks at time on the x-axis and
3:52logarithmic number of cells on the
3:54y-axis. And generally, bacteria have
3:57this type of growth pattern. What we
3:59notice about Mycobacterium tuberculosis
4:02is it has a very very long
4:05doubling time, or it has a very
4:07prolonged takes a really long time for
4:09this thing to grow. So, it has a very
4:11long
4:14doubling time, which means it has a slow
4:15growth process.
4:17One of the downsides about this is that
4:21well, there's two things. One is
4:22whenever you try to do cultures to
4:24actually see if you can grow this type
4:26of particular bacteria,
4:28it takes a really long time. So, often
4:30times when we try to do cultures for
4:31these patients, the clinical application
4:34is that it takes
4:36sometimes two sometimes like 6 weeks
4:42for cultures to grow out.
4:46And that's kind of one of the potential
4:48downsides.
4:49And so, that's kind of a clinical
4:51application of their really really long
4:53doubling time. It's since it takes super
4:55super long for these things to grow,
4:57when you try to culture these things, it
4:59just takes a really really really long
5:01time. But, these are the gold standard.
5:03Another thing about tuberculosis is it's
5:06it's predilection. So,
5:08Mycobacterium tuberculosis is what's
5:09called an obligate aerobe. All right?
5:12So, let's write that down. So, it has a
5:13long doubling time, but it has an it's
5:15an obligate
5:17aerobe, which means it really really
5:19needs and it really prefers
5:22to be in high levels of oxygen tension.
5:25If you look at the lungs, and we kind of
5:27imagine here for the lungs,
5:29all right? Here we have the different
5:31parts of the lungs. You have your upper
5:32lobes, you have your middle lobe just
5:34here on the right side, and then you
5:35have your lower lobes. Which of the
5:37lobes has the highest oxygen tension?
5:40It's generally the upper lobes. And so,
5:42what happens is mycobacterial species,
5:45not only do they have a very long time
5:47period we start off with this bacteria
5:49and then we double it, right? But also
5:53they prefer the upper lobes cuz that's
5:55where the highest oxygen tension is
5:58present. So one of the other things
5:59about this is because it's an obligate
6:01aerobe it has a preference
6:06for
6:08the apex of the lungs.
6:11Because of why? That has the highest
6:13oxygen
6:14tension.
6:16So that's going to be where it wants to
6:17live. It wants to be in those areas
6:20where there's going to be a lot of
6:21oxygen. All right. So so far we got
6:24Mycobacterium tuberculosis. One of the
6:25most important things about it with
6:28respect to its overall structure is the
6:29mycolic acid residues. Makes it pretty
6:31hardy. Also
6:33makes it really unique that whenever you
6:36take mycobacterial species and you
6:38undergo decolorization and then you try
6:41to again give them this new counter
6:43stain they don't take that up. They
6:45remain that reddish color. Again, they
6:48have a really long doubling time which
6:49kind of sucks when you got to culture
6:50these patients cuz it means it's going
6:52to take a while for you to actually get
6:53these to grow out. That also means that
6:55you got to put these patients on
6:56antibiotics for a really long time as
6:57well. So there's actually another
6:59component to that. It's an obligate
7:00aerobe. Prefers which areas of the
7:03lungs? It prefers the apex of the lungs
7:07because of the high oxygen tension.
7:09There's a third component to these that
7:10makes them really scary. The other
7:12component is that they have a lot of
7:13what's called virulence
7:16factors. All these mean is that
7:19essentially the mycobacterium have
7:21really nasty kinds of weapons that make
7:24it able to evade the immune system and
7:26make it really hard for the immune
7:28system to try to be able to kill these
7:29species. So what are these? Well,
7:32one of them
7:34is here in this S. So it's called a
7:36sulfatide.
7:38So let's say here you have a macrophage,
7:40right? Here's our macrophage. And this
7:42macrophage, generally what it wants to
7:44undergo
7:46is it wants to undergo a process
7:48>> [clears throat and cough]
7:49>> called uh making a phagosome. So, in
7:51other words, what happens is let's say
7:53you take this Mycobacterium species up.
7:56It undergoes phagocytosis. So, what does
7:58that mean? It takes it from the outside,
8:00which is out here,
8:02engulfs it, and brings it inside. That's
8:03called a phagosome. And the process by
8:06which we go to do this is called
8:09phagocytosis.
8:10Then, it wants to uh fuse with this
8:13little green structure. What's that
8:14called? A lysosome. So, then we should
8:17make
8:19a phagolysosome,
8:21which is the fusion of the phagosome
8:23and the lysosome.
8:25And what happens is the purpose of doing
8:27this is that you take all of these
8:29really nasty, harsh lysosomal enzymes,
8:33and you mix it with the phagosome that
8:35contains the bacteria. And the goal is
8:37to do what? Is to cause killing, right?
8:41It's to basically kill
8:44the Mycobacterium tuberculosis. We'll
8:46put MTB.
8:48That's the goal is to kill the
8:49Mycobacterium tuberculosis by using this
8:52phagolysosome.
8:54Well,
8:55what happens is it has this thing inside
8:57of it, and it's called a sulfatide. So,
9:00again, what is it going to be over here?
9:01It has something called a sulfatide.
9:05And sulfatide is essentially the
9:06virulence factor that inhibits
9:11So, they have the presence of this thing
9:12called a sulfatide. And the sulfatide
9:14inhibits at what point in this process?
9:17It inhibits the fusion of the phagosome
9:20and the lysosome. So, you don't get this
9:22process. Therefore, you can't have a
9:24really easy time killing the
9:26Mycobacterium tuberculosis. And so, this
9:28becomes more challenging. You see how
9:30that pretty much allows them to
9:32essentially kind of evade the immune
9:34system? Another thing is
9:36when you have just a couple of these by
9:38themselves, right? You just got one dude
9:41just hanging around and it's by itself.
9:42It's it's more susceptible to getting
9:44jacked up. So, because of that, what
9:47these things do is they carry this kind
9:49of molecule on them. And this is called
9:52cord factor. And cord factor is
9:55essentially kind of like a glue. That's
9:57the way I want you guys to think about
9:58it. It's like a glue.
10:00And essentially what it does is it does
10:01two things. One is it really helps to
10:03enhance your macrophage involvement. And
10:06it also helps to really inhibit
10:08neutrophils. But one of the biggest
10:10things about this cord factor is it
10:12really causes what's called serpentine
10:15kind of growth
10:16or serpentine formation is what I want
10:18you to remember. So, it causes
10:20serpentine
10:23formation or serpentine cords
10:26of the Mycobacterium tuberculosis. So,
10:29essentially this thing acts like a
10:31little glue between
10:34these guys. And then they can grow
10:38and almost give you like this Well, if
10:40you kind of think about it, it's maybe a
10:42little bit of a stretch with my drawing,
10:44but the serpentine cord, which is all of
10:46these mycobacterial species kind of
10:48linked together. It's really hard for a
10:50macrophage to be able to defend against
10:52this. All right? As compared to just one
10:55of these by themselves. So, it's a whole
10:57group of friends taking on this kind of
10:59like macrophage versus just one or two
11:02of them by themselves.
11:03All right? So, that's kind of the
11:05benefit of this is that it just makes it
11:06harder for the macrophages to fight
11:07against them. So,
11:10what we get out of this is that
11:11Mycobacterium tuberculosis is a pretty
11:13It's a pretty tough dude, all right? It
11:14has the capability of having mycolic
11:17acids, which makes it kind of resistant,
11:19all right? But also it also really makes
11:21it kind of interesting with very unique
11:23features when it comes to diagnosis.
11:25We know [clears throat] about some very
11:28unique characteristics of it. One is it
11:30takes a long time for it to be able to
11:32grow. And because of that, there's two
11:34downsides. One is it takes a long time
11:36for us to get cultures, and it also
11:38takes a long time for us to completely
11:39clear the infection. So, we should
11:41actually write that down. So, there's
11:42actually two components here. One
11:44>> [clears throat]
11:45>> is it takes time for it to grow, and the
11:47other one is it takes time for the for
11:49the infection to clear with antibiotics.
11:52Takes time
11:55to clear
11:58the Mycobacterium tuberculosis with
12:01antibiotics. You'll see whenever we get
12:03to the actual treatment section, people
12:05have to be on these antibiotics for
12:06sometimes 3 months, 6 months, 9 months.
12:09It really depends. That's an insanely
12:10long time, and it probably has something
12:12to do with that long doubling time.
12:14All right? We know it prefers the upper
12:16lobes of the lung. That's going to come
12:17in really, really critical when we talk
12:18about what's called reactivation TB. And
12:20also, one of the big, big things here is
12:22this thing is pretty hardy. Besides the
12:24mycolic acids, it has these things
12:26called sulfatides and cord factor, which
12:28basically allow for it to kind of become
12:31more hardy and make it harder for the
12:33immune system of the host to fight
12:35against it. Now,
12:37we know the pathogen that basically can
12:40cause this problem. The question is is
12:42how do we get it, and how does it
12:44actually cause a disease? Because you
12:46don't hear about Mycobacterium
12:47tuberculosis like a ton. Well, one of
Risk Factors for TB
12:50the big things is exposure.
12:52When we talk about risk factors for
12:53exposure, it's really
12:56how you
12:57>> [clears throat]
12:57>> I would say how you get the bacteria.
12:59And so, so this is basically how you get
13:04the bacteria
13:07into the lungs. That's really what it
13:09comes down to. It's how you get the
13:10bacteria.
13:11Now, when [clears throat] we talk about
13:13this,
13:15how do you how do you actually get it?
13:16Well, it's via respiratory droplets. And
13:18so, whenever a person is nearby somebody
13:21else who has maybe Mycobacterium
13:23tuberculosis,
13:25and they cough, they sneeze, and that
13:28respiratory droplets move into the
13:31lungs. They find an opportunity to get
13:33down here and start causing some
13:35potential damage if the person's immune
13:38system,
13:39for whatever reason, doesn't have the
13:41capability of being able to fight back.
13:42So, how this thing gets in is via the
13:44process that's called respiratory
13:46droplets. So, you have to be relatively
13:48close to someone who probably has TB
13:51or has a very high risk,
13:54you know, a scenario of potentially
13:56having TB. So, we're spreading this bad
13:59boy via respiratory droplets.
14:02How would I actually really increase my
14:03risk of getting the bacteria? Well, one
14:06is high prevalent areas. So, I would
14:08call this more specifically endemic
14:12exposure.
14:13That's really what it comes down to.
14:15It's endemic exposure. So, what areas
14:17that have a high kind of prevalence of
14:19tuberculosis? Asia, Africa,
14:23probably even like Latin America as well
14:26if we wanted to add that one in there as
14:27well. So, here, we'll actually we'll
14:28throw that one in there, too. Latin
14:30America. So, again, it's more
14:31particularly those who were kind of born
14:33into these particular areas or traveled
14:35to those areas. That's an exposure risk.
14:37The other thing is going to be some type
14:38of like close contact exposure. Um and
14:42so, what do I mean by this? This is
14:43could be a family member, this could be
14:45a friend, but it's someone who you were
14:47around and they had active TB. This is a
14:49pretty high risk component. So, again,
14:52endemic exposure really, really
14:53important especially for your exams. Um
14:55but I'd say the close contact one is
14:58just anybody. This doesn't really
14:59matter, but this is like again, it is
15:01the most likely one to have that highest
15:04risk of kind of inoculation. So, close
15:06contact exposure with someone, again, it
15:08has to be it's someone who has active
15:10TB. All right.
15:12The other component here is going to be
15:15probably higher risk kind of areas. Um
15:20and so, what do I mean by this? The last
15:22one I would say is just going to be kind
15:24of like overall high-risk regions or
15:26high-risk kind of like workplaces,
15:29facilities. So, high-risk areas.
15:33Um, and so the ones that I would want
15:35you guys to think about for this one is
15:37probably going to be like the hospital.
15:39So, anybody who's in the healthcare kind
15:41of like aspect, probably going to is
15:43going to have some degree of risk here.
15:45So, healthcare would probably be a big
15:47one. Um, another one I [clears throat]
15:49would definitely want to think about is
15:51potentially like homeless shelters. That
15:53is a potential risk factor as well. So,
15:55the homeless shelters.
15:57And [snorts] we could even go down the
15:58line. Sometimes they even include in
16:00like prisons. If you really want we
16:02could even add in like prisons as well.
16:04But, I think the biggest ones that I
16:06would want you guys to remember
16:08is probably going to be a close contact
16:10exposure or some type of like especially
16:12for the exams cuz it's a perfect
16:14vignette to set you up. They just came
16:15back from traveling or they were born in
16:17an some area of Asia, Africa. So, they
16:19had that exposure risk. All right. So,
16:21the first thing is they get the bacteria
16:23The second component is we have to then
16:25determine, okay,
16:26is a person they got the bacteria in,
16:30are they having a primary infection
16:34that progresses, right? That progresses.
16:39Or are they having a primary infection
16:44that goes dormant?
16:48And then in certain scenarios, it
16:52reactivates.
16:55And that's really kind of the step here
16:57that's critical. So, you have a person
17:00who gets a primary infection. Either
17:01they progress and they continue to have
17:04active disease or they get a primary
17:06infection, it goes dormant, and then it
17:08reactivates. So, let me explain
17:10something for a second. In most
17:12patients, I'd probably say greater than
17:15greater than or equal to 90% of cases,
17:18they go to a stage called latent.
17:21So, in other words, this means that they
17:23have latent TB. Latent TB means that
17:25they don't really have an active
17:27infection. What kind of happens here in
17:29just a simplistic way, cuz I'm going to
17:31go into detail more there in a second,
17:33is they get the bacteria in. So, here's
17:35the bacteria.
17:37Then what happens is
17:38if you have a good enough immune system,
17:41your immune system's capable, it's
17:42functioning in the normal individual,
17:44you'll wall this thing off. And when you
17:46wall it off, it kind of goes into this
17:48dormant state, where it's still there.
17:50It's still there. It's actually present
17:53in your lungs. You maybe didn't
17:54completely eradicate it. But you walled
17:56it off. And so, it's in this sleepy
17:58state. That's called latent TB.
18:01In about probably whatever the remaining
18:03portion of this is, so less than 10% of
18:06cases, they can progress. So, in other
18:09words,
18:10you get this kind of infection, the
18:12pathogens get here,
18:14maybe you try your best to kind of wall
18:17it off, but it doesn't really do a great
18:18job because your immune system isn't
18:20strong. And because of that, it spreads
18:22to a bunch of different areas. And maybe
18:24it spreads throughout the lungs. Maybe
18:26this even gets into the bloodstream. It
18:29gets into your lymphatics, and this
18:30thing starts to kind of go haywire
18:32because you just don't have maybe that
18:34proper immune system to wall this thing
18:36off. And so, because of that, this thing
18:39spread throughout the lungs, or it
18:42spread to the bloodstream, and it became
18:44disseminated.
18:45In this scenario, we call this
18:48primary progressive TB.
18:51So, primary progressive
18:55TB.
18:56All right? So, that is the first thing
18:58that I want you guys to remember is,
19:00again, most of the patients, if they
19:02have a good enough immune system, they
19:04go into a state of dormancy. Some of
19:06those patients who just don't have a
19:07robust immune system, they're probably
19:08somewhat immunosuppressed,
19:10and we'll get into that. They can't kind
19:12of wall this bacteria off. And so
19:14because of that it can kind of spread
19:16spread spread even get into the
19:17bloodstream and start to disseminate.
19:19>> [gasps]
19:19>> And another scenario out of this
19:21patients that most often go into latency
19:24in certain scenarios, sometimes you have
19:28something that pushes the individual to
19:31where they had it walled off, but then
19:33what happened is
19:35is it decided to maybe come out of
19:37dormancy. And I'll get into how this
19:39actually happens, but whenever they're
19:41in these areas, especially reactivation,
19:45reactivation typically likes to occur in
19:48the upper lobes of the lungs. Why?
19:50Remember I told you
19:52that this is an area of high oxygen
19:54tension.
19:55And so what we'll notice in patients who
19:57get reactivation TB is they end up
19:59getting kind of this liquefactive
20:01necrosis
20:03that occurs in the apex of the lungs.
20:06And that my friend is called
20:07reactivation TB. All right, so this is
20:10called reactivation.
20:13Some even call it post-primary. So
20:15reactivation TB or post-primary TB in
20:17case you hear that. So,
20:20what I want you to get at is you get
20:21exposure to the bacteria, gets its way
20:23into the lungs. If it gets into the
20:25lungs, it can either do one of two
20:27things. It can progress if you just
20:28don't have the robust immune system or
20:30you can go into a dormant state. But in
20:32certain scenarios,
20:34you can reactivate it. The question
20:37becomes not as much here, it can be a
20:40certain degree of a question, but I'd
20:41say a lot of it comes in here.
20:43What's really
20:45the reason why they come out of latency
20:47and go into this reactivation state?
20:49And often times it comes down to a
20:51suppressed immune system. So one of them
20:54is that you have a really diminished
20:56activity
20:58and I promise you'll see what I mean by
20:59this a little bit later is you have a
21:01reduced activity of your T-cells. And
21:03particularly it's called your TH cells.
21:05Your Technically, these T helper cells
21:08are CD4 cells. That's really what we're
21:10going to call them. They're CD4 cells.
21:13And what is really really critical about
21:16our CD4 cells, which we're going to
21:17represent here, is that they help to
21:19secrete a bunch of different types of
21:20cytokines that are really helpful for
21:22this TB.
21:23One that they release is really
21:25critical. And what it does is it really
21:27kind of activates macrophages, makes
21:29them really really just beasties, and
21:31try to try to really focus on killing
21:33and destroying these mycobacteria. Makes
21:35them a little bit more hardy. All right?
21:37That chemical that they release is
21:40called interferon gamma. All right?
21:44Interferon gamma activates macrophages.
21:47And then what macrophages do is they
21:49also pump out a particular cytokine to
21:52activate more T cells, bring in more
21:54macrophages. And that's called TNF
21:56alpha. But TNF alpha is not only
21:59released
22:00by, in this case, the macrophage, it's
22:02also released by
22:05these T cells.
22:07And what happens is in all of this is
22:08that T cells really really, whenever
22:11they get hit with interferon gamma,
22:13it activates macrophages. Macrophages
22:15release TNF alpha. T cells release TNF
22:17alpha. What does this do? Brings more
22:19macrophages to the area.
22:22All this is trying to do is is if I
22:24bring all of these immune system cells
22:26to the area,
22:27theoretically, I should be strong enough
22:30to take this bacteria and push it into
22:34the jail.
22:35Put it into the prison. And I'll explain
22:37what that prison is over in the
22:39pathophysiology. But for right now, what
22:40I want you to trust about this is that
22:43really what we're trying to make is this
22:44this prison is what we're going to refer
22:46to as a granuloma for right now. So, for
22:48right now, I just want you to trust me
22:49that this is what we're going to
22:50eventually push them into is a
22:53granuloma. All right? But we need
22:56sufficient amount of T cells, and we
22:57need sufficient amount of these like
22:59inflammatory cytokines.
23:01So, what if I don't have T and what if I
23:03have a reduction
23:05>> [clears throat]
23:06>> in these cytokines?
23:08And the inflammatory cytokines, I'd say
23:10the most important one
23:12>> [clears throat]
23:14>> is going to be what?
23:15Well, it definitely is interferon gamma,
23:17but I'd say TNF alpha
23:19is probably going to be the biggest one
23:21that I want you guys to associate with
23:22this.
23:23So, [clears throat]
23:24what conditions
23:26really reduces your T-cells? Come on,
23:28think about it.
23:29If I have a condition called
23:32HIV
23:34or AIDS, what does that do to my T-cell
23:36levels? It drops them.
23:38So, in patients who have HIV AIDS, you
23:40drop their T-cell levels. If you drop
23:42[clears throat] their T-cell levels,
23:44they don't make as much of the
23:46interferon gamma. Can they stimulate the
23:48macrophages? No.
23:50If they can't, they inhibit the
23:51macrophages. Do they release TNF alpha?
23:53No. Because of that, do you put them
23:55into the prison? No.
23:57And so, what ends up happening is,
23:59unfortunately, these little suckers
24:00escape
24:02and they grow and they grow and they
24:03grow and they grow.
24:05And this is basically what pushes the
24:06bacteria
24:09to grow
24:11and cause more damage.
24:13And that's what we don't want, right?
24:14So, after this, you're getting more of
24:16this bacterial growth.
24:18If I have patients who have really,
24:20really low levels of these cytokines,
24:22what would be a reason for this
24:23happening? Well, I think the biggest one
24:26is any kind of immunosuppressant.
24:28That's really the case. Is any
24:30immunosuppressant drug is probably going
24:32to be a pretty strong trigger here. So,
24:34we'll write this one out. So, this is
24:35really any kind of
24:37immuno-
24:38suppressants.
24:41And again, I'll give you guys a couple
24:42examples of these, but I think the most
24:44common one that I would want you guys to
24:46think about for the exam
24:48is what type of drug?
24:50>> [clears throat]
24:50>> A TNF alpha inhibitor.
24:52So, steroids, transplant rejection meds,
24:56TNF alpha inhibitors, which we use in a
24:58lot of different types of conditions,
24:59especially things like inflammatory
25:01bowel disease. And we use it in a lot of
25:03like rheumatic diseases. So, these are
25:06These are things that we really want to
25:07consider. If you drive down their kind
25:10of overall immune response, you don't
25:11keep them in these granulomas.
25:14And so, if we can't keep them in the
25:15granulomas, either they progress,
25:18right? That's one of the other concept
25:19here is that again, same It's kind of a
25:21similar concept here. They don't put
25:23them in the granulomas,
25:25or they don't maintain the granulomas.
25:28They break free. And when they break
25:30free, their predilection
25:33is for what area?
25:34To the apex of the lungs.
25:36And then for the primary progressive,
25:38it's usually middle and lower lobe,
25:39which I promise we'll get into.
25:41So again, what I want you to understand
25:43here is when a person gets exposed to
25:44something like Mycobacterium
25:45tuberculosis, the exposure is getting
25:47the bacteria in.
25:49The reason why it even becomes active,
25:52which is either primary progressive or
25:53reactivation,
25:55is you have to have something that's
25:57suppressing the immune response. HIV
26:00AIDS dropping your T cells, or
26:02immunosuppressants shutting down the
26:03cytokine response.
26:05That could be steroids, that could be
26:06transplant rejection meds, that could
26:08even be TNF alpha inhibitors. HIV AIDS
26:10is probably going to be one of the
26:11highest risk, probably about 50-fold
26:13increased risk in tuberculosis with HIV
26:16AIDS. All right? That's the big thing.
26:17Now, if you have a good immune system,
26:19you're going to probably be fine, and
26:21you're going to go into a dormancy
26:22state, and you don't have to potentially
26:23worry about this. And now, these are the
26:25biggest risk fa- These are the biggest
26:27risk factors for why this happens, but
26:29it could be a lot of other mild ones. I
26:31just wanted to give you the most
26:32probably extreme ones, but you can see
26:34this in patients who just have
26:36We can see this in patients who are just
26:37malnourished, acutely ill, periods of
26:39just overall physical stress. This can
26:40also drive this process.
26:42All right. So, with that being said,
26:45we talked about the particular pathogen,
26:48which is Mycobacterium tuberculosis. We
26:50talked a lot about the risk factors for
26:53getting exposed and we talked about the
26:54risk factors that actually cause it to
26:55progress.
26:57What I need to do now, which is going to
26:59take a little bit of time, but I want
Pathophysiology of TB
27:01you guys to stick with me, is to go
27:03through once the moment this
27:04mycobacterium hits the alveoli,
27:07how does it cause these granulomas?
27:10Which is going to be a you know, a hefty
27:11discussion, but let's kind of dig into
27:13it. All right, so first thing is how do
27:14they spread again?
27:16Respiratory droplets.
27:18So, there is some type of movement of
27:21these pathogens.
27:23And basically,
27:25they are going to be spread via
27:28respiratory droplets from a close
27:29contact exposure, from being in an
27:31endemic population, from being in a high
27:34risk area. Either way, these things make
27:36their way
27:38into the lungs. I told you a little bit
27:41about what's the most common locations.
27:44I'm going to recap that again.
27:45Oftentimes these prefer to start off
27:48their initial infectious kind of process
27:51really in the lower lobes
27:55and in the middle lobes.
27:57And again, it could be the right or the
27:58left, but again, usually there's only a
28:00middle lobe on the right, all right?
28:01[laughter]
28:02But it could be it's usually more in the
28:03middle, lower lobes. So, that's the
28:05first thing that I want you to remember
28:07is initial location is often times it's
28:09going to be middle lobes or lower lobes.
28:11But there's another component that I
28:13have to add on to that.
28:15So, first thing is often times the
28:17initial location where it's going to
28:18start all of its kind of process is
28:20middle
28:21or lower lobes.
28:25But the other thing is look how close it
28:27is to this pink tissue that I'm going to
28:28draw here.
28:29So, we have a piece of kind of a pink
28:31tissue here. This is the visceral
28:33pleura.
28:35And then what's this one here called?
28:36That's called the parietal pleura.
28:38It's just beneath the visceral pleura.
28:41So, we call that a subplural
28:44type of location, right? So, it's middle
28:46lower lobe, and it's usually sub
28:49plural.
28:51All right.
28:52We have a location of where these
28:54initially start once you get it
28:56exposure.
28:58Now, once they get in there, guess what?
29:01Macrophages say,
29:03"Hold my beer. I got you. I'm going to
29:05help you out a little bit here, buddy."
29:06So, what happens is the macrophages are
29:08going to be a part of your innate immune
29:09response.
29:10And what they're going to do is is
29:12they're going to see these
29:13mycobacterium, and they're going to
29:15undergo a process, which I told you
29:17guys, which is going to be where they
29:19eat them. They undergo the eating of
29:20them. They bring them inside of them.
29:23And what's that called? This is called
29:25phagocytosis.
29:27So, the first step is going to be
29:28something called phago
29:32cytosis. That's going to take it inside.
29:34It's going to bring it inside of this
29:35little thing called a phagosome, which
29:37is going to be right there. And again,
29:39what's going to be inside of it? It's
29:40going to be the mycobacterium
29:41tuberculosis.
29:43Then, what happens is
29:45this son of a gun, we already told you,
29:47it's supposed to fuse. What is it
29:49supposed to fuse with? Well, then you
29:51have your phagosome,
29:53and it's supposed to combine with
29:55something called a lysosome, right? So,
29:57here's our lysosome.
29:59And this is going to have all the
30:00lysosomal enzymes. This phagosome is
30:03going to contain the mycobacterium
30:04tuberculosis. And what is it supposed to
30:07undergo? It's supposed to undergo
30:09fusion. So, then we should have
30:11something called fusion. So, here we
30:13have again the phagosome,
30:15which is basically the macrophage that
30:17contains the
30:19TB.
30:21Then, after that, we're going to have
30:23fusion of the phagolysosome. Well, we
30:25should have fusion of the phagolysosome.
30:28So, this step we should have
30:30phago
30:33lysosome
30:35fusion.
30:37Which is going to be at this step right
30:38here. So, the first process was
30:41phagocytosis. The second process is
30:43going to be phagolysosome fusion. I told
30:46you that there was something that
30:47happens at this step.
30:49We have something inside of the
30:52mycobacterium species that prevents
30:53this. Do you guys remember what it was
30:55that inhibits this process?
30:57I'll give you a hint. It started with an
30:58S. It was called the
31:00sulfatides.
31:02Yeah, so the mycobacterium has something
31:04called sulfatides. And the sulfatides
31:07are pretty much
31:09a virulence factor that what it's going
31:11to do is it is going to inhibit this
31:14phagolysosome fusion. That's what it's
31:17going to do. So instead of these guys
31:19going and actually fusing together,
31:22what happens? We're going to inhibit
31:24that process. We're going to inhibit
31:26this fusion. And so now what happens is
31:28these were supposed to come together,
31:30but they don't. And so we kind of keep
31:32this, unfortunately, the phagolysosome
31:34never fuses. And so we're still stuck
31:37with
31:38this this guy over here containing all
31:41of that TB. And we're still
31:42unfortunately stuck with this lysosomes
31:44over here which aren't able to fuse.
31:48What happens is
31:49this bacteria, it's not really
31:51undergoing destruction.
31:52So because of that, guess what it
31:54decides to do.
31:55It decides to replicate
31:59in the macrophage.
32:04So that's the next step. So the first
32:06thing was phagocytosis. Second thing is
32:08once we actually have the phagosome is
32:10to fuse it with the phagolysosome. All
32:12right, to actually fuse it with the
32:14lysosome to make a phagolysosome. So
32:16these were supposed to come together.
32:18All right, we're supposed to have the
32:19fusion of these two. And again, it's
32:21going to be the what two things? It's
32:22the phagolysosome
32:25I'll actually put this here. It's
32:26supposed to be the fusion of the
32:28phagosome and the
32:30lysosome. We're supposed to bring these
32:33together, but but not going to. Because
32:36of that, all you end up having here is
32:38just bacteria that are going to
32:40replicate in the macrophage. These
32:42things are going to just replicate like
32:43bunnies.
32:45Because of that, now we get this
32:46infected macrophage. So now I have this
32:49infected macrophage, and what does it
32:51have all the way filled inside of it?
32:54It's got all these
32:56mycobacterium species just growing
32:57within it. So again, what is this here
32:59called? This is called a infected
33:03This is called an infected alveolar
33:07macrophage.
33:09Now, that's the first thing that I want
33:12you guys to remember in this step. So
33:13the first component here that happened
33:16is that you had inhalation via
33:18respiratory droplets, gets into the
33:20airway, causes its initial kind of site
33:22of infection, which is middle lower
33:24lobe. It's usually subpleural.
33:27If you zoom in into the alveoli,
33:29macrophages are supposed to undergo
33:30phagocytosis. That actually does occur.
33:32They get a phagosome. You're supposed to
33:34combine the phagosome and the lysosome
33:36to make a phagolysosome. But guess what
33:38the sulfatide does? The sulfatide
33:40inhibits that fusion. So now that never
33:42happens, and then you just have all of
33:44these bacteria that replicate replicate
33:45in the micro macrophage. Now I got an
33:47infected macrophage. It's incapable of
33:50doing its job.
33:51So what does it need? It's got to call
33:53out on to its friend.
33:56So what happens is
33:57the infected macrophage releases a
33:59couple different cytokines.
34:01It releases things like interleukin 1.
34:04It releases things like TNF
34:06alpha.
34:07And that's going to get pumped out from
34:09this alveoli, which is where all of this
34:10process is occurring. It's going to get
34:12into the blood, or it's going to get
34:14into the lymphatic circulation.
34:16Once it does that, these cytokines are
34:18going to go and activate different types
34:20of immune system cells, right? And
34:23generally the way I want you to think
34:24about them is just overall
34:25antigen-presenting cells. And we're
34:27going to try to activate these
34:28antigen-presenting cells. What are the
34:30two antigen-presenting cells that I
34:31really want you guys to remember in this
34:33scenario?
34:34The two antigen presenting cells is
34:35going to be the dendritic cells. That's
34:38going to be kind of the heavy hitters in
34:39this scenario.
34:41And then again, it's going to be
34:41monocytes that come to the area and
34:43generally turn into
34:44macrophages.
34:46So, these are the two ones that I want
34:47you to think about, but the heavy hitter
34:49in this scenario is going to be the
34:51dendritic cells. So, they're going to
34:52come from the lymph, they're going to
34:53come from the blood, and they're going
34:54to come to this area. All right? So,
34:56we're going to activate those puppies.
34:58And again, who's really helping with it?
35:00It's these high levels of things like
35:02interleukin 1 and tumor necrotic factor
35:04alpha that's being released by the
35:06infected macrophages.
35:08Once that happens, these dendritic
35:10cells, here's our antigen presenting
35:11cell. We're just going to use this. This
35:12is our antigen
35:14presenting cell. All right? Here is the
35:16Mycobacterium tuberculosis.
35:19It undergoes phagocytosis. So, once it
35:22undergoes phagocytosis inside of this
35:25dendritic cell,
35:26basically what happens is it will take
35:28some pieces of it and expose it on its
35:31MHC 2 complex.
35:33When it exposes it on the MHC 2 complex,
35:35you're supposed to have this interaction
35:36here, which is the MHC 2 complex
35:39with your T cell receptor.
35:42These interact. Basically, once you get
35:44this connection, you have generally a
35:47co-stimulatory signal, and this thing is
35:49ready to roll. What's ready to roll?
35:51This is
35:53a naive T cell, which means it doesn't
35:55really it's it's not kind of it doesn't
35:57know what its job is meant to be. It
35:59doesn't know if it's meant to be a T
36:00helper cell, a cytotoxic T cell. It
36:02doesn't even know what kind of T helper
36:04cell it needs to be.
36:05So, what happens is the macrophage is
36:06smart.
36:08And some other cytokines that get
36:09released here is not just interleukin 1
36:12and tumor necrotic factor alpha.
36:14So, let's actually kind of show that
36:15these are the cytokines first.
36:18And then we'll bring these over here.
36:23But, another cytokine that's also
36:25getting kind of pumped out here.
36:28And causes some fatigue
36:30helpful scenarios here is called
36:32interleukin 12. So that's another side
36:35that kind of gets released. So it's
36:36interleukin 1, TNF alpha, and
36:38interleukin 12. Once the dendritic cell
36:41undergoes this phagocytosis, takes a
36:43piece of that mycobacterium and exposes
36:45it on side of its membrane, activates
36:48this interaction,
36:49then interleukin 12 comes in and really
36:52drives this naive T cell to have an
36:54actual determination of what it's going
36:56to be.
36:57And so what it does is it says, "All
36:59right, folks, I know what I'm meant to
37:00be when I grow up."
37:02And it turns into a very specific type
37:04of T cell that undergoes an excessive
37:07amount of proliferation.
37:09And this is called T helper 1 cells.
37:13And that's where these are becoming the
37:15big dogs. The macrophage, it just
37:16couldn't handle the it couldn't handle
37:18the heat. And so what ends up happening
37:20is
37:21with this interaction with the
37:22antigen-presenting cells and the
37:24interleukin 12, this naive T cell, it
37:26became TH1 cells.
37:28TH1 cells, I already told you, they
37:30release a very, very heavy amount of a
37:33very specific type of cytokine. Do you
37:35guys remember what that one is? It's
37:37called interferon gamma.
37:40Interferon gamma is the big cytokine in
37:43this scenario that is going to help us
37:45to drive a particular type of immune
37:48response.
37:49One of those immune responses is it's
37:51going to tell this macrophage
37:53to become better. It says, "Just come
37:56on, bro. Level up your game."
37:58And so the macrophage kind of goes from
38:00being like a phagocytic type of factory
38:02where it kind of eats things to where it
38:04becomes really, really good at releasing
38:06things like reactive oxygen species and
38:08proteases and tries to undergo a lot of
38:10intracellular killing.
38:12All of this is really trying to put this
38:13bacteria into dormancy. So one of the
38:15things that it does is it stimulates a
38:17lot of what's called intracellular
38:19killing by the macrophage. It basically
38:21just makes it like a beast. Makes it a
38:23kind of like a a little bit more of a
38:24enhanced activated macrophage. So, it
38:27goes undergoes intracellular killing.
38:30And that's one thing that it does to
38:31this macrophage is it really, really
38:32amps up its activity to be able to kill
38:34the pathogen.
38:36The other thing here is
38:38is it tells these macrophages to start
38:40to undergo this kind of conversion and
38:43transformation process. And so, it
38:45drives this kind of conversion and
38:47transformation process, if you will,
38:49where a bunch of these macrophages kind
38:51of come together and fuse.
38:53And it becomes one big giant cell.
38:56That's what we call them. We call them
38:57giant cells. So, we actually call them
38:59Langhans giant cells.
39:02So, Langhans giant cells. Some of them
39:04actually make what's called epithelioid
39:05histiocytes, but I don't want you guys
39:07to go too crazy on that. I just want you
39:09to know that what we make is is we
39:11stimulate the formation of these things
39:13called Langhans giant cells. It's
39:15basically, I'm not kidding, just a bunch
39:17of macrophages that are fused together.
39:19And they may contain some of the
39:21mycobacterium tuberculosis in them. And
39:23what else is actually happening,
39:24interferon gamma not only is helping
39:26convert them, but it's making them good
39:28at killing. All of this is supposed to
39:31basically
39:32do two things. One is to help the
39:35macrophages be better at killing the
39:37pathogen and also start to kind of like
39:39wall this off. This big cell becomes
39:42like a wall. It's trying to keep the TB
39:45in one particular place, not letting it
39:47spread around. That's one of the
39:49benefits of this.
39:51So, in this scenario, we started off, we
39:53got the exposure. That thing got into
39:55the lungs. It interacted with the
39:56macrophage. Macrophage couldn't handle
39:58it. Says, let me tell my buddies. Tells
40:00antigen-presenting cells. They come in,
40:03they help with phagocytosing them,
40:04presenting them to naive T cells, and we
40:06turn this into a T helper 1 cell. These
40:08things go ham and start pumping out
40:11interferon gamma.
40:12When they do that, activates the
40:14macrophages, causes them to convert into
40:16big giant cells. We start kind of
40:18killing the pathogen and making a wall.
40:20So, let's talk about what that wall is.
40:23That wall,
40:25if you will, is called a granuloma.
40:28Now, [sighs]
40:28this is what's really interesting. We're
40:30having the granuloma, which we're kind
40:32of just zooming in on here. It's really
40:34in this alveoli. It's Where is it again?
40:36I told you. Usually middle, lower lobe,
40:39and subpleural.
40:42If I zoom in on this and how all of this
40:44is happening in kind of a really cool
40:46sequence.
40:47From the most outer part of this
40:49granuloma is what? Well, the first one
40:52is the orange cells. These are called
40:54your T helper 1 cells.
40:56What are the job of the T helper 1
40:58cells? Well, think about it. This thing
41:00is on the outside and it's just spewing
41:03out what type of cytokine to tell the
41:06Langhans giant cells, to tell the
41:07macrophages to be good at their job.
41:09What is that? Interferon gamma. So, it's
41:12just pumping out
41:13interferon gamma to feed what?
41:17The inner core.
41:19It's feeding the inner core of
41:21macrophages and giant cells. All right.
41:24Then we get into the second component.
41:26What's that? Well, technically it's
41:28going to be the kind of the outer wall,
41:30which is all those macrophages that fuse
41:32together. Some of them are epithelioid
41:34histiocytes and a lot of them are
41:36Langhans giant cells. So, that's the
41:38second part here.
41:40As the Langhans
41:43giant cells. And again, I would even add
41:45in there, if you guys want, that these
41:47are also going to contain the
41:49epithelioid histiocytes. These are
41:51basically
41:52a bump. Basically, I'd say a group
41:56of macrophages
41:59that are fused.
42:02And they're kind of helping to contain
42:04some of this pathogen. That's really
42:05their job. It's a bunch of them that
42:07help to contain the particular pathogen.
42:09And then the inner kind of core is the
42:12macrophages. Now, some of these
42:15obviously could be infected. Some of
42:16them may not be infected. So, but again,
42:18I think the important thing is that a
42:20lot of these are the ones that are
42:21really undergoing a lot of the killing
42:23process. And some of them will contain
42:25the pathogen inside of them. And even
42:27some of the Langhans giant cells may
42:28contain some of the pathogen inside of
42:30them. But the big component here is that
42:32we're containing it in this outer rim of
42:35T cells. So again, macrophages are cool
42:38because they're supposed to do two
42:39things in this scenario. One is they're
42:41supposed to kill, but they're also
42:44they're really important to maintain
42:46this granuloma.
42:48And so they do two things. One is they
42:49kill
42:51the Mycobacterium tuberculosis. The
42:53second thing is that they really pump
42:55out tons of something called TNF alpha.
42:59So, that's another really, really
43:01important thing that I want you guys to
43:02understand. We made the granuloma, which
43:05was
43:06the macrophage phagocytosed the
43:08Mycobacterium. Couldn't really kill it.
43:11Told T cells, "Hey T cells, I need the T
43:13helper one cells to come over here." T
43:15helper one cells come over. They
43:17activate the macrophages, make them
43:18better eating more of them. Then they
43:20have some of the macrophage turned into
43:21giant cells and come around them. And
43:24then we end up with this kind of like
43:25nice little circular structure here
43:27that's containing a bunch of different
43:28types of cells.
43:30Now, interferon gamma is keeping the
43:32wall in place. Tumor necrotic factor
43:34alpha is really, really critical though.
43:36I'll explain why.
43:38The tumor necrotic factor alpha, there's
43:40there's released from Well, actually,
43:42here, let's just let's zoom in it from
43:43outside here. When we take these cells
43:46here, the T cells, they do also release
43:49TNF alpha, but the macrophages
43:52are really that heavy source of TNF
43:54alpha.
43:55And so what happens is the TNF alpha is
43:57really cool
43:59because what it's trying to do is to
44:01keep more
44:03monocytes, right? Which will come to the
44:06area and turn into macrophages to keep
44:08the lymphocytes coming to the area and
44:10keep reinforcing that granuloma. So,
44:13these are supposed to do that. They're
44:15supposed to pump out things like TNF
44:17alpha to help to stimulate the
44:19macrophages to come to the area. To help
44:21to stimulate the T cells to come to the
44:23area. Right? That's what we want. And
44:25because if they come to the area, we're
44:26going to reinforce and maintain the
44:29granuloma. I told you
44:32if you give someone TNF alpha
44:33inhibitors, you shut down that TNF
44:35alpha. TNF alpha is really critical for
44:38maintaining the granuloma.
44:40These T cells around the outer core are
44:43keeping the granuloma also in place with
44:46interferon gamma. So, the maintenance of
44:49the granuloma is really primarily
44:50maintained by TNF alpha and T cells
44:53secreting interferon gamma to keep the
44:55macrophages intact.
44:57All right. What happens is when you have
45:00all of these cells clumped up together
45:02is oxygen requirements go up. So, your
45:05tissue starts to become hypoxic. So, the
45:07center core
45:09center of the granuloma
45:14experiences undergoes
45:16hypoxia.
45:18That's one event that actually starts to
45:20take place. There's a bunch of different
45:22cells here. A lot of cells. Not enough
45:25oxygen to go around. And so, the most
45:27susceptible area, which is the center
45:29portion of it, undergoes hypoxia. That's
45:31one component here.
45:33All right? The second component here
45:36is that
45:37the macrophages, they are releasing tons
45:40of reactive oxygen species, tons of
45:43proteases. So, there's going to be lots
45:45of reactive oxygen species and proteases
45:47that are released by the macrophages in
45:49attempt to kill the mycobacterium.
45:52Right? And so, there's lots of reactive
45:54oxygen species, lots of proteases.
45:56And what that is designed to do is to
45:59kill the mycobacterium. But this stuff
46:02isn't selective. It says, "I'll damage
46:04whatever I have around me."
46:06And what it does is is since you have
46:08hypoxia to the center and all these
46:10reactive oxygen species, it causes
46:12tissue necrosis in the center. And so
46:15the combination of these things lead to
46:18a tissue necrosis in the center.
46:21And that tissue necrosis starts to kind
46:23of look like it has it's like look like
46:25a bunch of cheese like with holes in it
46:27like Swiss cheese and we call this
46:29caseous necrosis.
46:31So it's technically called caseous
46:34necrosis.
46:36And when that happens, all of the
46:37center, which will represent we'll do it
46:39here. We'll just do it in this kind of
46:41um
46:42Let's just use the black actually. All
46:44of this all of this is the caseous core.
46:47That is going to be the inner center
46:49gooey portion that contains all of that
46:52dead tissue. All right? That's the
46:54tissue necrosis. So what we give this
46:57kind of thing is it's technically a
46:58granuloma but it's got a necrotic
47:01[snorts] caseous core. So what do we
47:03call this thing? Technically this thing
47:05is called a
47:06caseating
47:08It's called a caseating
47:11granuloma.
47:14And And again, if somebody were to say,
47:16"Hey Zach, what's a what's a granuloma
47:17again?" It's an outer core of T cells.
47:20Technically this would be your T helper
47:221 cells. Then you're going to have your
47:23Langhans giant cells. Then you're going
47:25to have your macrophages, right?
47:28And again, in the inner center of it,
47:29you're going to have some necrotic
47:30debris. Why? Because a bunch of the
47:32cells in the center start to undergo
47:34hypoxia because there's too much cells
47:35not enough oxygen delivery. And on top
47:37of that, reactive oxygen species and
47:39proteases that are being released by
47:43macrophages
47:45cause a lot of innocent bystander
47:47destruction. And all of that inner
47:49destructive tissue Actually, we'll do a
47:51different color. Let's do
47:54for right now
47:55let's do kind of a pinkish color for
47:58right now.
47:59Because all of the pink I want to
48:01represent like dead cells. This is like
48:03dead macrophages.
48:05This could be some dead
48:07Langhans giant cells. But what's in the
48:09inner center of it?
48:11The the actual mycobacterium. That's
48:12kind of in this cheesy center.
48:15That is really the inner center goo,
48:17which is going to be containing dead
48:18cells, inflammatory exudate, and the
48:21mycobacterial species.
48:23But the beautiful thing about a
48:24caseating granuloma is I want you to
48:27think about this as the TB prison.
48:29This is essentially going to be my TB
48:32prison.
48:33And if I have a proper immune system, I
48:35should be able to contain these things
48:37in that middle lower lobe portion of the
48:39lung just beneath the pleura.
48:41If I don't have the immune system
48:43capable, it could then progress. If it
48:45goes into latency, it could potentially
48:47reactivate. So now,
48:50let's go into the next step here. The
48:51next component is
48:53we've done a pretty good job at forming
48:55these caseating granulomas.
48:58And again, it's really important to
48:59remember where is this? So what's this
49:01portion here? I'm just going to use the
49:03outer
49:04portion of the lung. We're going to call
49:06this the subpleural portion.
49:08And it's going to be in the middle lower
49:09lobe. And again, it's going to have that
49:12outer core, which is the
49:15T cells, and it's going to have that
49:17inner kind of portion with the Langhans
49:19giant cells, and it's going to have all
49:21this caseous necrotic material. There's
49:23our caseating granuloma, right? Here's
49:26the thing.
49:27There's all these lymph nodes that are
49:29in the hilum. This is connected, dude.
49:31So you got to remember there's there's
49:33lymphatic system channels that exist
49:36here.
49:37And this can drain
49:39into this lymph node.
49:40And so all of these mycobacterial
49:42species, they had the opportunity to
49:43potentially spread over here and cause
49:45that same kind of concept over here in
49:47the hilar lymph nodes.
49:49And so whenever they do that, you get
49:50the same thing, which will have the
49:52outer T cell core.
49:55Then you'll have the Langhans giant
49:57cells.
49:59And you'll have some macrophages, but a
50:00lot of dead cellular debris containing
50:03the mycobacterium. All right?
50:06Now,
50:07when this happens, you have two
50:08components here.
50:09One is you have the caseating granuloma
50:12at this portion of the lung.
50:14And you have a caseating granuloma here
50:17at the lymph node. These are two
50:19different components here. So, the first
50:21thing is we have something called a Ghon
50:23focus.
50:25So, what is a Ghon focus? The Ghon focus
50:26is one. That's basically a caseating
50:29granuloma that is usually near the
50:31middle lower lobe of the lung, and it's
50:33a subpleural structure. So, that's the
50:36first thing. That's going to be this
50:37part. All right? The second one is the
50:40hilar lymph node. So, you have caseating
50:42granulomas that form within the hilar
50:43lymph node and makes it bigger.
50:45And so, that causes hilar
50:49lymphadenopathy.
50:51Now, the combination
50:55of these two gives you something
50:58called
51:02Ghon complex.
51:06That is the next component here.
51:08So, we have a Ghon complex.
51:11So, a Ghon complex is essentially a Ghon
51:13focus, which is a caseating granuloma at
51:16the subpleural portion of the middle
51:17lower lobes of the lungs, and hilar
51:19lymphadenopathy, which is due to
51:21caseating granulomas within the hilar
51:22lymph node. That's a Ghon complex. Now,
51:25a Ghon complex
51:28can pretty much You're at this point,
51:30these bacteria are pretty much dormant.
51:33They're kind of in a sleepy state.
51:35They're not killed, they're still there.
51:38What happens though is that we try to
51:40show that this area of the lung healed.
51:43And when it does that, it kind of
51:45undergoes some fibrosis.
51:47And we call this when it undergoes
51:49fibrosis and calcification of the Ghon
51:51complex, we call that a Ranke
51:54complex.
51:56So, what is a Ranke complex? It's
51:57essentially I mean, honestly, the
51:59simplest way of defining this is
52:01essentially this is a
52:03fibrocalcification process. That's all
52:06it is. It's that the Ghon complex
52:07undergoes fibro
52:11calcification.
52:16So, let's example that.
52:17Here,
52:18we're going to have the Ghon focus.
52:21Here, we'll have a
52:22caseating granuloma right there.
52:24Again, T cells, outer core, Langhans
52:27giant cells.
52:28And then,
52:29the inner kind of portion which contains
52:31all of that dead cheesy necrotic
52:32material is the caseating portion.
52:35And then, what happens is it undergoes
52:37fibrosis. What color should we represent
52:39with? Let's do this kind of bluish color
52:40here. So, now it undergoes some
52:43fibrocalcification.
52:45So, now all of this undergoes fibro
52:49calcification
52:51in these areas. That is called a Ranke
52:53complex.
52:54And pretty much this thing is at a point
52:56of where we would consider pretty much
52:57like healed.
52:59So, it's kind of like a healed up Ghon
53:00complex.
53:02There's another thing that's really
53:03interesting.
53:04These Ghon complexes, again, this is
53:06technically dormant. This is technically
53:09a healed dormant spot. There's another
53:11kind of thing that happens, and I
53:13actually found this super interesting
53:14cuz I always wondered, whenever a TB
53:16reactivates, why does it How does it end
53:18up reactivating in the upper lobe of the
53:20lung? I just couldn't figure that out.
53:22It How does it actually get there?
53:24>> [snorts]
53:24>> And so,
53:25it does travel, but it had to be there
53:28even before you undergo the reactivation
53:31process.
53:32And so, what's kind of cool here is
53:35you have here I'm going to say that this
53:36is our Ghon
53:37focus,
53:39outer ring of T cells,
53:42Langhans giant cells. And for right now,
53:45what I'm going to do is I'm going to
53:45have some purple, which is again our
53:48mycobacterium.
53:50This mycobacterium,
53:52a lot of them before they just get ready
53:54to go into this dormancy state, some of
53:56them
53:57kind of hitch a ride
54:00via the bloodstream,
54:02and they hitch a ride via the lymphatic
54:04system.
54:05And they go to other areas of the body
54:07where they can also go and lay dormant.
54:09They can go to the kidneys, they can go
54:10to the brain, they can go to the heart,
54:11they can go all over the dang place. But
54:13this is before, right before they go
54:15into this dormancy state.
54:17One of the areas that it also loves to
54:19go to before it kind of decides to go to
54:20bed
54:22is into the apex of the lungs.
54:24So it uses the bloodstream, it uses the
54:25lymphatic channels to get to the upper
54:27lobes of the lungs.
54:29And then essentially what happens is
54:30they make these like tiny little like
54:32foci. It's almost like a Ghon focus, but
54:36it's so tiny that you can barely see it
54:38on something like a chest X-ray. But you
54:40do get kind of like a little a little
54:42granulomatous formation here. There's
54:44like a little granulomatous formation.
54:46So we started off with a Ghon focus
54:49right here. This is our Ghon
54:53focus.
54:55And then what happened is it spread up
54:57here to the apex of the lungs via the
54:59lymph and the blood. This is called
55:01lymphohematogenous seeding.
55:03This is called a Simon focus. Let's
55:07actually write that down. This is called
55:08a Simon focus.
55:10And that Simon focus is basically some
55:13of the mycobacterium tuberculosis that
55:15traveled from the subpleural middle
55:17lower lobe caseating granuloma to the
55:19apex and it goes into a dormancy state.
55:22And that's all this is, my friends. So,
55:25we have here a Simon focus. So again, a
55:28Ranke complex is basically
55:30fibrocalcification of the Ghon complex.
55:34A Ghon complex that then breaks off and
55:37gives these small little like
55:38microscopic caseating granulomas to the
55:41apex of the lungs before it goes into
55:42dormancy, Simon focus. Ghon focus, just
55:45that subpleural portion of that
55:48caseating granuloma. Hilar
55:49lymphadenopathy is due to swelling that
55:51occurs in the hilar lymph node due to a
55:53caseating granuloma there.
55:55Wow. All right. So, at this point, we
55:58have become infected. The innate
56:00response with your macrophages couldn't
56:02handle it. Who they call in? They call
56:03the TH1 cells. TH1 cells really help to
56:06form the granuloma. You got the
56:08granuloma. Where do they like to form?
56:11In the middle lower lobe of the lung.
56:13Usually near the pleura.
56:15When it undergoes that kind of process,
56:16it can then spread via the lymphatic
56:18system and go to what?
56:21>> [clears throat]
56:21>> It can go to nearby lymph nodes. What's
56:23the lymph nodes? Hilar lymph nodes. When
56:25you get a caseating granuloma in that
56:27portion of the lung plus enlargement of
56:29the hilar lymph node, we call that a
56:31Ghon complex.
56:33This is pretty much is getting ready to
56:34go into dormancy. It's getting ready to
56:35be controlled and go to bed.
56:38If we undergo fibrocalcification,
56:39essentially all this means is it's
56:41undergone a healing process. And this
56:44generally kind of takes some time, but
56:45it's basically healed it's healing.
56:48It's a healing up of that Ghon complex.
56:51Some of them will hitch a ride via the
56:53lymphohematogenous seeding process and
56:54get to the apex of the lung and create a
56:56Simon focus. And this becomes really
56:58critical. This is critical
57:03to reactivation TB because they're
57:06hanging out there already. They are
57:09ready whenever the opportunity arises.
57:11You give them the opportunity, they will
57:13take it and they'll start undergoing
57:16necrosis and liquefactive kind of
57:18processes of that caseous material
57:20in the upper lobe if you let them
57:22reactivate. So, we can't let them, but
57:24that's what will happen. All right.
57:26Let's now take the time to talk about
57:28when a person gets infected,
57:31we undergo the exposure, we go through
57:33all of this immune response. How do I
57:36really, really know if it's latent?
57:39How do I really know if it's primary
57:40progressive? How do I really know if
57:43it's reactivation TB? Not just the
57:45process of it, but how do I truly
57:47understand them based upon the whole
57:49immune response and which one's causing
57:51lung tissue destruction, which one's
Latent vs. Active TB
57:52going to have an abnormal kind of chest
57:54x-ray, etc. Let's do that. All right, so
57:56we started off here and we said again,
57:57what happened here? We had a person they
58:00get an exposure. They undergo the immune
58:02response, innate, then they go through
58:04the adaptive, which is the TH1, then
58:06from there we create granulomas and
58:08generally these granulomas are
58:09caseating. And again, they often times
58:12will form where?
58:14Initially, they'll form in this kind of
58:16middle lower lobe of the lung, right?
58:19That's where we said and then again, it
58:20can also form here in the hilar lymph
58:22nodes, right?
58:24And
58:25I think the critical thing to remember
58:27here is again, how do we kind of define
58:29this? This was technically in this
58:31scenario, this was called that Ghon
58:33complex, right?
58:35Now,
58:36in most individuals,
58:39we said what what percentage? Probably
58:41greater than 90%, greater than or equal
58:44to 90%, they go into this latent state.
58:48All this means is
58:50is that we were able to contain the TB,
58:53right? So essentially, what that means
58:55is you contained this. You had the
58:57proper immune response.
58:59And whenever this happened,
59:01you were able to pretty much keep these
59:05kind of pathogens snoozing, if you will.
59:08So you kept them in the dormant state,
59:09you basically prevented them from
59:11constantly undergoing replication. So
59:12they're there, but they're not actively
59:14doing any kind of problems and damage.
59:17All right, so you created that you
59:18created these caseating granulomas in
59:19these areas and maybe, maybe they even
59:22underwent fibrocalcification and healed
59:24up.
59:25But in this scenario, you have an
59:27individual who these bacteria are
59:29dormant, but they're not replicating and
59:32causing tissue destruction. That's the
59:34key here. So, latent TB, you got a good
59:36immune response, you go this way. You go
59:39into this dormant state. That's what I
59:40want you to remember. This is basically
59:42is the Mycobacterium tuberculosis are
59:45dormant. They're there. They're not
59:48growing. They're not undergoing any
59:50tissue destruction, but they are there.
59:52The person does have the TB bacteria
59:55there.
59:56All right?
59:57In less than
59:58or equal to
1:00:00Actually, we say less than generally,
1:00:01less than 10%
1:00:04of cases,
1:00:05if you just don't have that proper
1:00:07immune response, right? To be able to
1:00:10contain or to form these granulomas,
1:00:12they may not completely be maintained.
1:00:15So, if you don't have the T cells that
1:00:17are able to keep that interferon gamma
1:00:19coming, you don't have the tumor
1:00:22necrotic factor alpha that's present for
1:00:24macrophages because you're suppressing
1:00:26it in some way, shape, or form. In those
1:00:28scenarios, you can't maintain the
1:00:30granuloma. So, here's what I want you to
1:00:31think about. Here's the granuloma,
1:00:33but we can't any longer keep it formed.
1:00:37And so, because of that,
1:00:39all this Mycobacterium
1:00:41basically starts to grow.
1:00:44And when it grows,
1:00:47it again can grow within this particular
1:00:50portion of where it started its
1:00:51infection, which is usually like the
1:00:52middle,
1:00:53maybe even lower lobes. Again, middle,
1:00:56lower lobes.
1:00:57So, what happened here is you had the
1:00:59caseating granuloma, but you couldn't
1:01:01contain it anymore. You couldn't
1:01:03maintain it. It bust out. The bacteria
1:01:05start causing further destruction.
1:01:08At that point, this is called primary
1:01:11progressive TB. So, again, what's this
1:01:13one called? This is called primary
1:01:19progressive
1:01:21TB.
1:01:23You just basically you couldn't contain
1:01:25it. So in this scenario the
1:01:27Mycobacterium tuberculosis
1:01:30are active
1:01:33and the Mycobacterium tuberculosis is
1:01:35causing
1:01:37damage to the lung tissue.
1:01:40And usually what's interesting about
1:01:42this is that when we think about these
1:01:44like pathogens, they often times in this
1:01:47primary progressive one, they can kind
1:01:49of form like consolidations.
1:01:51Basically kind of just damaged areas of
1:01:53fluid,
1:01:55um exudate, a lot of different types of
1:01:57immune system cells and dead tissue. It
1:01:59kind of accumulates within the alveoli
1:02:00and the bronchioles and it forms kind of
1:02:02like this consolidation, if you will.
1:02:05And so that's one thing that's really
1:02:06kind of unique about primary progressive
1:02:07TB is it's more of
1:02:10a middle lower lobe consolidation.
1:02:15And so sometimes, we'll get into this,
1:02:18is this can kind of mimic like a
1:02:19pneumonia. It's almost like an atypical
1:02:21pneumonia person who just keeps getting
1:02:23treated with antibiotics and they're
1:02:24just not getting better over
1:02:25recurrently. At least three more times
1:02:27they've been treated for this this
1:02:28pneumonia and they're just not getting
1:02:30any better. And you get a chest x-ray
1:02:31and they still have this consolidation
1:02:33that's present in that particular lobe
1:02:34of the lung, middle lower lobes. That is
1:02:37pretty much consistent with that primary
1:02:39progressive TB and especially if they
1:02:41have the
1:02:42what else up here?
1:02:43The hilar
1:02:45lymphadenopathy because again, the
1:02:47bacteria will also not be able to be
1:02:49contained here and it'll grow and
1:02:51potentially cause some enlargement
1:02:52within the lymph nodes.
1:02:54All right. Well, that's one thing.
1:02:57This patient, you went this way because
1:02:59you just didn't have the immune
1:03:01response.
1:03:02This way, you had the immune response.
1:03:05But then at some point, you lost your
1:03:07immune response.
1:03:08Maybe again, person decided to get HIV
1:03:11AIDS. Maybe the person decided to take
1:03:12an immunosuppressant like TNF alpha
1:03:13inhibitor. They took a steroid. They got
1:03:15a transplant. They're on transplant
1:03:16rejection
1:03:17They got acutely ill. Whatever it
1:03:19happened, their immune system activity
1:03:21dropped. Their TNF alpha dropped, their
1:03:22interferon gamma dropped, their T cell
1:03:24level activity dropped, and they no
1:03:26longer could contain these granulomas.
1:03:30But remember, I told you that there's a
1:03:31specific place for reactivation TB.
1:03:34What I want you to remember
1:03:37is that it's usually
1:03:39in these upper lobes.
1:03:41And so what happens is you had these
1:03:44kind of like little focus. What were
1:03:46they called? Come on. I want you guys to
1:03:48remember. Don't you dare say a Ghon
1:03:50focus. It was a
1:03:52Simon focus.
1:03:54And they could have a couple of these in
1:03:55the upper lobes of the lung.
1:03:57They had the Mycobacterium tuberculosis
1:03:59that was there.
1:04:01What happens is you lose the immune
1:04:02activity, all right? You lose the TNF
1:04:05alpha, you lose an interferon gamma. The
1:04:07macrophages go into like this weird
1:04:09destructive state. And they start
1:04:11releasing a bunch of like proteases,
1:04:13metalloproteinases.
1:04:15And all they basically do is they
1:04:17destroy all of that caseous material
1:04:19that was in there. There was some
1:04:20caseating granulomas even in the the
1:04:23dormant state.
1:04:25And what happens is it gets filled with
1:04:27all of this necrotic liquid material.
1:04:30So all we're going to do is we're going
1:04:31to liquefy the caseous necrotic material
1:04:33in these granulomas.
1:04:36Now, we end up with these. Here's what
1:04:39happens.
1:04:41They get close to a bronchi. They get
1:04:44close to a bronchi.
1:04:46And these things are like I mean, I'm
1:04:47not kidding. This necrotic material,
1:04:48imagine like a basically like
1:04:50hydrochloric acid.
1:04:51They get close
1:04:54to the airway and they start eating
1:04:56their way in
1:04:58to the airway.
1:05:00And then this bacteria that's all in
1:05:02this kind of liquefied broth, if you
1:05:04really want to think about it like that,
1:05:06can easily
1:05:08spread
1:05:09via the bronchi all over the dang lungs.
1:05:12And then on top of that, if they decide
1:05:14to cough and they cough up that debris,
1:05:17it basically gets rid of all of that
1:05:19debris that's in these
1:05:22kind of like liquefied cavities, if you
1:05:24will.
1:05:25And so now all of that moved, they
1:05:27coughed all of that up.
1:05:30That allows for them to be extremely
1:05:32potentially contagious.
1:05:34But what it did is
1:05:36is it left these cavities
1:05:39present in the upper lobes of the lungs.
1:05:41And these cavities, which are a mixture
1:05:43of again liquefied necrotic debris and
1:05:46fibrous tissue, these are called
1:05:48fibrocaseous cavities.
1:05:50And so that's really what's key about
1:05:52this one. And this is called
1:05:54reactivation
1:05:56TB.
1:05:57So reactivation TB, the classic thing
1:06:00for this one is cavitary lesions in the
1:06:03upper lobes. That's what I want you to
1:06:05remember differentiating these two from
1:06:07each other. Is again, cavitary
1:06:12lesions. Where?
1:06:15In the apex. Why the apex?
1:06:18Because it's the highest level of oxygen
1:06:19tension. That's where they're going to
1:06:21thrive, that's where they're going to
1:06:22grow, that's where they're going to
1:06:23cause tons and tons of destruction. So,
1:06:25that's one of the big differences
1:06:27between these two. And again, the same
1:06:29concept exists here. These Mycobacterium
1:06:31species, they're all mixed into that
1:06:33liquid like necrotic broth, if you want
1:06:36to think about it. So when we think
1:06:37about the TB here, it's the same thing.
1:06:40They are extremely active.
1:06:42So they have their Mycobacterium
1:06:44tuberculosis is active.
1:06:47And the Mycobacterium tuberculosis is
1:06:49causing What did I write here? Causing
1:06:51damage. Yeah, same same exact thing.
1:06:54It's leading to a point which I'm going
1:06:56to make here in just a second.
1:06:57>> [snorts]
1:06:57>> All right? So they're still causing
1:06:59damage and they are still active in this
1:07:01scenario.
1:07:03Here's the thing. With these two,
1:07:05they'll basically keep kind of spreading
1:07:07throughout the lungs. This will keep
1:07:09spreading throughout the lungs. So,
1:07:11you're going to get from this
1:07:13progressive lung damage. That
1:07:15progressive lung damage that you'll get
1:07:16from both of these, we see as the form
1:07:19of pulmonary TB. Which again, this can
1:07:23look a lot of different ways from both
1:07:24of them.
1:07:25Obviously, in this person they may have
1:07:27some kind of findings of uh pneumonia
1:07:30presentation. Maybe they have a
1:07:31prolonged fever, night sweats, chills.
1:07:34Maybe they have a cough. They have a
1:07:35chest x-ray that shows a consolidate
1:07:36that doesn't go away.
1:07:38Reactivation TB. In this one, they can
1:07:40have
1:07:41pulmonary TB symptoms. Maybe they have a
1:07:43very very productive cough. Maybe they
1:07:45have some weird amorphous breath sounds.
1:07:46They also have fever. They also have
1:07:48night sweats and chills and weight loss.
1:07:50Again, that's the
1:07:52the result of the pulmonary destruction.
1:07:55The other problem here is that these can
1:07:57also spread where? These pathogens can
1:08:00get into the bloodstream. So, that's
1:08:01what we get worried about with these.
1:08:02Is that if these pathogens, they get
1:08:04their way
1:08:06Here they are, let's say.
1:08:09And they get their way in
1:08:11to the lymphatic system
1:08:12or they get out here
1:08:17and they get their way into the
1:08:20circulation.
1:08:22That's kind of a pretty terrible issue.
1:08:24So, if these pathogens decide to spread
1:08:28get into the circulation, they decide to
1:08:30go into the lymphatic circulation, where
1:08:32can they go? Well, from here they can go
1:08:33all over the dang place.
1:08:35When that happens, we call this
1:08:36extra-pulmonary TB.
1:08:39So, this is basically it's using the
1:08:41blood and the lymph as a highway to go
1:08:43and spread to other organs besides the
1:08:44lungs. So, this is called extra-
1:08:48pulmonary
1:08:49TB. So, when a person has active TB,
1:08:53really what we call active TB is where
1:08:55the mycobacterium is active. It's
1:08:57reactivation TB and primary progressive
1:09:00TB. And it can exist in a pulmonary TB
1:09:02form, which is the result of the lung
1:09:04damage, or it can exist in extra
1:09:06pulmonary TB where they go to different
1:09:08organs and cause damage in organs
1:09:10besides the lungs.
1:09:12That's really, really critical here. So,
1:09:14I know that this is a lot of stuff and
1:09:16it's probably something where you're
1:09:17like, do I really need to know all of
1:09:19this stuff? I think everything is really
1:09:21critical when you're trying to build a
1:09:22foundation, but I think a lot of it can
1:09:24come down to a very simple discussion
1:09:26right here. So,
1:09:28when I talk about latent TB,
1:09:30I want you to think about something in
1:09:32both of them. What happened when they
1:09:35both got an infection? When they both
1:09:36got exposed, their macrophages came,
1:09:38they both had a TH1 response.
1:09:40They probably had some degree of
1:09:41interferon gamma that was there,
1:09:43especially in the latent TB. If they got
1:09:45a good immune system, they should have a
1:09:46normal TH1 response. They should be able
1:09:48to push these guys into forming
1:09:50granulomas. So, in other words, if I
1:09:52were to test the T cells one day,
1:09:55and I were to expose them to that TB
1:09:57antigen, would my T cells be able to
1:09:59remember that? That's the key between
1:10:01both of them. And if you're exposed,
1:10:04yes, they should both have that memory,
1:10:07theoretically, right? So, the answer to
1:10:09this is yes. And so, the way that we
1:10:10determine that is we do things like
1:10:11positive um
1:10:13we do what's called um positive um
1:10:15purified protein derivative or a
1:10:17tuberculin skin test essentially, and we
1:10:19inject like 200 different types of
1:10:21mycobacterial antigens into the skin and
1:10:23see if the immune system will at least
1:10:25drive those TH1 cells to help to push
1:10:27and make these granulomas within the
1:10:29skin. All right? And so, this should be
1:10:32positive. They should be positive for
1:10:34this patient if they have that exposure.
1:10:36Same thing over here. In a perfect
1:10:39world, I'm going to be very, very
1:10:40careful because I don't want you guys to
1:10:41always assume this, but in a perfect
1:10:44world, if you did the tuberculin skin
1:10:47test in the purified protein derivative
1:10:48in the active TB, it would also be
1:10:50positive because again, they had the
1:10:52exposure. This is about exposure, all
1:10:55right? It doesn't tell you if they have
1:10:56active TB or not. It just tells you, do
1:10:58they have TH cells that if I expose them
1:11:00to that antigen, they would remember it,
1:11:02meaning I had an exposure.
1:11:04The only thing I will say
1:11:07is that you have to watch out for false
1:11:10negatives.
1:11:12We'll talk about this in the diagnostic
1:11:14section, but in individuals who probably
1:11:16have active TB, what's one of the
1:11:19characteristic components here um
1:11:22in TB, active TB, is they probably have
1:11:25some degree of like an
1:11:26immunosuppression, some degree of it.
1:11:29And so because of that, you can get
1:11:30false negatives if they have an a really
1:11:33deprived immune system. It's called It's
1:11:34called energy.
1:11:36And so we are a little bit more careful
1:11:39of that. But either way, this tells me
1:11:41that they had an exposure.
1:11:44So all this test will tell me is that
1:11:46they had an exposure. What about this?
1:11:49Well, which one did I tell you is their
1:11:51active TB? Well, it's not latent. So if
1:11:54they they're not active, would it cause
1:11:56any types of symptoms and destruction of
1:11:58tissue? No. So there's not going to be
1:12:00There is no destruction.
1:12:03And so all right, here's what I would
1:12:04say. Is there any lung destruction? All
1:12:06right, let's write it like this. No. No
1:12:08lung destruction. All right? Is there
1:12:10lung destruction here? Absolutely there
1:12:12is. How would lung destruction look in
1:12:15these patients? One is they could have
1:12:18the presence of symptoms. If there is no
1:12:21lung destruction, there is no symptoms,
1:12:23theoretically. Theoretically, right? And
1:12:26if there is destruction, theoretically,
1:12:28there is going to be symptoms. So that's
1:12:30one difference here. No lung
1:12:31destruction, theoretically, you should
1:12:33not have any types of pulmonary TB
1:12:35symptoms or extra pulmonary TB symptoms.
1:12:38The same thing here. If you have lung
1:12:39destruction, you theoretically could
1:12:41have some extra pulmonary or pulmonary
1:12:43TB symptoms.
1:12:45Things like fever, cough,
1:12:47night sweats, chills, weight loss. They
1:12:50could have potential pulmonary
1:12:52complications as a result of it. But,
1:12:54that's one thing.
1:12:56The other component here is when I get
1:12:58imaging of the chest,
1:13:00would I see anything that would be
1:13:02abnormal that would suggest lung
1:13:04destruction or any kind of damage
1:13:06theoretically for latent TB? Well, Zach,
1:13:08you did say that I could see healed-up
1:13:11areas. I'm not asking for healed-up
1:13:12areas like a Ranke complex or anything
1:13:14like that. I'm saying, do I see active
1:13:16disease like a consolidation in the
1:13:18middle lower lobe, hilar
1:13:20lymphadenopathy? Do I see any kind of
1:13:22fibrocaseous cavities in the upper lobe?
1:13:25No. And so, generally, these should have
1:13:28no
1:13:29abnormal, and we're going to just use
1:13:31chest x-ray for right now, abnormal
1:13:33chest x-ray. There should not be any
1:13:36abnormal chest x-ray. So, boom.
1:13:39This one, you definitely should have an
1:13:41abnormal chest x-ray.
1:13:43And again, what would it theoretically
1:13:45show?
1:13:46Well, it depends. Are we talking about
1:13:48this as the patient who has something
1:13:50like a primary progressive? They would
1:13:52have that middle lower lobe
1:13:53consolidation, they would have some
1:13:55hilar lymphadenopathy. It would kind of
1:13:57look like pneumonia. This one, they
1:13:59would have some fibrocaseous cavities.
1:14:02Theoretically, they could even have a
1:14:03pneumothorax. This one, you can have
1:14:05pleural effusions. Absolutely, you can
1:14:08have abnormal chest x-rays. But, the big
1:14:10difference here is that they're going to
1:14:11have something abnormal on their imaging
1:14:13that suggests that there is some active
1:14:15destruction. So, this is exposure.
1:14:18This right here is depending upon if
1:14:20they had the immune response capable of
1:14:23containing those granulomas and forming
1:14:26the granulomas. If you had the immune
1:14:28system, you'll probably be okay, and
1:14:29you're going to a dormant state. If you
1:14:31don't have the immune response capable
1:14:33of keeping them dormant, they're going
1:14:34to cause some damage. And that's what
1:14:36makes this really, really critical to
1:14:37understand.
1:14:39All right.
1:14:40Let's move on to the last part here,
1:14:42which is talking about what are these
Clinical Findings and Complications of TB
1:14:44symptoms? What would they potentially
1:14:45look like? All right. well
1:14:47first thing here is pulmonary TB is
1:14:49pretty classic in in the sense that the
1:14:52way I would want you guys to think about
1:14:53it is it's kind of like
1:14:56I I think about finding TB in the
1:14:58vignettes in two forms. One is a new
1:15:00onset uh hemoptysis. That's definitely
1:15:03one way.
1:15:04A second way is probably a person who
1:15:06has
1:15:07a recurrent like progressive pneumonia
1:15:11that's just not getting better with
1:15:12antibiotics. Those are the two ways that
1:15:14I often times will see on the exams that
1:15:16they'll test it. But let's dig into this
1:15:17a little bit more.
1:15:19When you have that immune response
1:15:21that's occurring in these areas
1:15:23I told you that there was macrophages
1:15:25and there were T cells getting involved.
1:15:28And dude, oh dude, are they pumping out
1:15:30tons of things like what? Interleukin 1
1:15:34and TNF alpha.
1:15:36But the big one here is for sure-skis
1:15:39the TNF alpha.
1:15:40These things are getting pumped out. So
1:15:42all of this is happening where they are
1:15:43just pumping out the TNF alpha, the
1:15:45interleukin 1. What do we know about
1:15:47these guys?
1:15:49Well, one is that it causes some
1:15:51involvement of systemic kind of
1:15:54involvement, particularly of the
1:15:55hypothalamus and maybe even our muscles.
1:15:58And so what we see is
1:16:00as we see this kind of activation of
1:16:03these cytokines here. Let's actually
1:16:04we'll bring it down here. We'll say the
1:16:05first thing here that we see
1:16:07is we see an elevation.
1:16:10We see a lot of cytokines from like
1:16:12interleukin 1
1:16:13and TNF alpha. A lot of that systemic
1:16:17kind of involvement here. High levels of
1:16:19this.
1:16:20What happens with these
1:16:22is that whenever they get into the
1:16:23bloodstream, they go to the
1:16:24hypothalamus, activate the hypothalamus.
1:16:26Also, TNF alpha is a really powerful um
1:16:30it really helps with a lot of
1:16:31catabolism, right? Um particularly a lot
1:16:34of cachectic kind of effects of the
1:16:35actual muscle tissue, the lipids. And so
1:16:37we see a lot of cachexia or weight loss
1:16:41as a result. So we see a lot of weight
1:16:43loss
1:16:44that occurs.
1:16:45And that's usually because of the a lot
1:16:47of the catabolism that is occurring
1:16:49within inside of the muscles and the
1:16:50actual fat tissue.
1:16:52The other thing is that we activate the
1:16:53hypothalamus. And the hypothalamus
1:16:55resets our body's thermostat and causes
1:16:57things like fever and
1:17:00night sweats.
1:17:02And so, when an individual who comes in
1:17:05with potentially fever and night sweats
1:17:09and unintentional weight loss, all
1:17:11right? And if I throw in cough, you'd
1:17:13probably be like, "Oh, dude, do they
1:17:15have like lung cancer?" That could be
1:17:17another possibility. You need to get a
1:17:19chest x-ray and say, "Oh, there's a
1:17:20weird kind of like lesion there in the
1:17:21lung."
1:17:23I think the big thing comes down to what
1:17:24was their risk factors for exposure.
1:17:26What was the potential risk factors for
1:17:27potentially progression?
1:17:29But here's another thing.
1:17:31When we talk about this cytokine event,
1:17:33that's one thing that's causing the
1:17:34fever, the night sweats, the weight
1:17:35loss. The second thing is that they most
1:17:37often have a cough. And it's probably
1:17:40going to be more of a productive cough.
1:17:42And I think this productive cough is
1:17:44going to be much, much more likely to be
1:17:47heavily, heavily involved in things like
1:17:49the reactivation TB more than something
1:17:52like the primary progressive TB. It's
1:17:55funny enough, sometimes primary
1:17:56progressive TB can be more asymptomatic
1:17:58than it is symptomatic. That's why we
1:18:00really focus a lot on reactivation TB in
1:18:02your exams. But you definitely can see a
1:18:04productive cough with both of these. You
1:18:06have inflammation. You're You're going
1:18:08to activate J receptors, cough
1:18:09receptors. They're going to cough. And
1:18:11if they have this consolidation, that's
1:18:12going to come with it. If they erode
1:18:15into an airway and some of that liquid
1:18:18necrotic debris gets pushed into the
1:18:19bronchioles, activates inflammatory and
1:18:22activates J receptors, cough receptors,
1:18:23they cough, you're going to get a
1:18:25productive cough, right? Extremely
1:18:27common, but I want you to definitely
1:18:29associate this one
1:18:31probably more so with the reactivation
1:18:36probably more than primary
1:18:40progressive.
1:18:42All right?
1:18:43So, that's the next part that I want you
1:18:45guys to think about is they have a
1:18:46productive cough, fever, night sweats,
1:18:49weight loss.
1:18:50The next thing here is and this is why I
1:18:52tell you, if you have a person with a
1:18:53cough, fever, maybe some weight loss
1:18:56over a long period of time,
1:18:57it kind of acts like maybe especially
1:18:59with a cough and a low-grade fever, you
1:19:01think about pneumonia. And they get
1:19:02antibiotics cuz they have a they have an
1:19:04infiltrate on their chest x-ray that
1:19:05shows that and they just don't get
1:19:07better.
1:19:08Another thing that actually is really
1:19:09important to remember is that sometimes
1:19:10if that kind of reactivation TB, that
1:19:13fibrocaseous cavity erodes and erodes
1:19:15and erodes into the bronchial walls,
1:19:17and it when it does, it erodes into
1:19:19things like the bronchial arteries or
1:19:21the pulmonary artery branches, it can
1:19:23cause
1:19:24them to bleed into the airway. And so
1:19:26because of that, not only can they
1:19:27cough, they can potentially cough up
1:19:30blood. And hemoptysis hemoptysis should
1:19:33always be on your differential in a
1:19:35patient who presents with um TB should
1:19:37always be on the differential in a
1:19:38patient who presents with hemoptysis.
1:19:40So, hemoptysis is another potential
1:19:42symptom manifestation. This one I want
1:19:45to tell you about is extremely rare. I
1:19:47think it's not very common, but I'm
1:19:49going to tell you it and this is usually
1:19:51going to be some type of pneumo- thorax.
1:19:54Usually it's a secondary pneumothorax
1:19:56because there's an underlying lung
1:19:57disease here and it's usually going to
1:19:59have necrosis from those fibrocaseous
1:20:03cavities that erode into the actual lung
1:20:06wall through the visceral pleura and
1:20:08allow for air to escape. So, what I want
1:20:10you to do is look at this kind of
1:20:11diagram. I'm just really just zooming in
1:20:12on this particular area. Here's all this
1:20:14liquefied necrotic debris and it's
1:20:16eroding
1:20:18into the bronchial wall,
1:20:20>> [sighs and gasps]
1:20:20>> eroding here to the alveoli and into the
1:20:23pleura.
1:20:24Here, we have an opportunity for blood
1:20:27to leak out that causes the hemoptysis.
1:20:29And here, we create an opportunity or a
1:20:31channel for air to go from the lungs and
1:20:34go into this kind of plural space. And
1:20:37so now we're going to have air kind of
1:20:39leaking into the plural space. So that's
1:20:41another potential thing to think about.
1:20:43So so far the big ones are fever, night
1:20:46sweats, weight loss, productive cough,
1:20:48hemoptysis. Another thing here
1:20:51is abnormal auscultation.
1:20:53When I go up and put my stethoscope and
1:20:55I listen to the patient,
1:20:56it really could be variable. So what do
1:20:59I mean by that? It's this is not going
1:21:01to be super like helpful to be honest
1:21:03with you because it could sound like
1:21:04they have pneumonia. So they're going to
1:21:06have some abnormal breath sounds.
1:21:09There is one that we potentially
1:21:11associate with TB. It's called amorphous
1:21:17breath sounds.
1:21:19And essentially the way that you could
1:21:21think about it is if you've ever had
1:21:22like a
1:21:23like [snorts] a Coca-Cola bottle that's
1:21:25empty and you try to blow into it, it
1:21:27kind of sounds like a hollow kind of
1:21:28sound. That's really what this is and
1:21:30it's just the sound of air rushing in to
1:21:34the lungs
1:21:36and then moving through that kind of
1:21:37hollow cavity. That's an amorphous
1:21:40breath sound. But other things that you
1:21:42could potentially hear is just you may
1:21:44hear signs of like consolidation. So
1:21:46there could be positive
1:21:48consolidation signs. That means that
1:21:50they could have increased tactile
1:21:52fremitus. They could have dullness to
1:21:53percussion, bronchophony, egophony,
1:21:55whispering pectoriloquy. They could even
1:21:57have bronchial breath sounds, right? But
1:21:59they're going to have positive
1:22:02signs
1:22:03of
1:22:04lobar consolidation.
1:22:08Now, the thing I want you to remember is
1:22:11is with this
1:22:14consoli-
1:22:16-dation.
1:22:17Thing I want you to remember about this
1:22:19is that with the consolidation, which
1:22:21type of TB would I most likely associate
1:22:24this one with? Probably the primary
1:22:26progressive and then the amorphous
1:22:27sounds I would associate more with a
1:22:29cavitary lesion, which is reactivation
1:22:32TB. So, to put it all together, if I had
1:22:34a person who comes in with fever,
1:22:36productive cough, maybe some night
1:22:38sweats, maybe some weight loss, they
1:22:41have amorphous breath sounds,
1:22:43I might start and especially hemoptysis,
1:22:45I'm going to start thinking about the
1:22:46possibility of TB.
1:22:49Now, here's the next component.
1:22:51What if this TB is so vicious
1:22:55that it gains the ability to spread to
1:22:58other places. Maybe it's in this kind of
1:23:00consolidation here
1:23:02and it works its way through the pleura
1:23:06and it gets its way into the pleural
1:23:08space.
1:23:09And now, because of this,
1:23:12I have a fluid
1:23:15that's forming because of all this
1:23:16capillary leakage and inflammation
1:23:18because of the tissue destruction and I
1:23:19got some Mycobacterium tuberculosis in
1:23:21there.
1:23:22What's this called? This is called a TB
1:23:25pleural effusion. That's really what it
1:23:28is. So, that's one thing that can happen
1:23:29is that the TB can spread through the
1:23:32pleura and they can get into the pleural
1:23:34space. You can also get inflammation,
1:23:36it's kind of like a parapneumonic
1:23:37effusion, and then that kind of bacteria
1:23:39jumps right into it. So, this is going
1:23:40to called a TB
1:23:42pleural
1:23:44effusion.
1:23:46So, this is extremely common, I'd say
1:23:48with TB. A lot of the times patients who
1:23:50have TB pretty because it's because that
1:23:52kind of consolidation is subpleural,
1:23:54it's easy for you to get pleural
1:23:55effusions. And so, it's pretty common,
1:23:57especially in TB.
1:23:58So, that's one thing. So, watch out for
1:24:00a TB pleural effusion.
1:24:03The second thing I want you to remember
1:24:04is
1:24:05if these pathogens are eroding their way
1:24:08into the lung tissue and then they get
1:24:11they kind of hop in to your
1:24:14lymphatic circulation or they hop into
1:24:16the um bloodstream, they can kind of
1:24:19spread, right? And this is kind of a
1:24:21really, really dangerous process. When
1:24:23they spread, they can spread to other
1:24:24different areas of the lungs. And when
1:24:26they spread, they cause like these like
1:24:27little inflammatory lesions that look
1:24:29like kind of like little seeds, and they
1:24:31can go everywhere. I'm talking like
1:24:33everywhere throughout the lungs. And
1:24:35that's one thing that we get kind of
1:24:36worried about is when we see like these
1:24:38like small little like looks like millet
1:24:40seeds all over the lungs, this is called
1:24:43miliary TB. This is called miliary
1:24:48TB. So, whenever you see like tons and
1:24:50tons and tons of these like little
1:24:51millet seeds or nodules all over the
1:24:53lungs, you can assume that the pathogen
1:24:56has got into the bloodstream or into the
1:24:57lymphatic system or both, and it's
1:24:59spread throughout all of the lungs, and
1:25:00it's probably also gone into the
1:25:02bloodstream to other areas of the body.
1:25:04Well, what are some of those other
1:25:05areas?
1:25:07Well,
1:25:08one that I get worried about is if it
1:25:10gets into the bloodstream and it gets
1:25:11into the meninges of the brain. All
1:25:12right? That's a pretty terrifying one,
1:25:14and we can get something called TB
1:25:16meningitis. Now, one thing about TB
1:25:19meningitis
1:25:21is that it loves to affect the base of
1:25:23the brain. And so, where you'll probably
1:25:25start to see some problems is right here
1:25:27at the base of the brain. They get a
1:25:29basically kind of a thick exudate that
1:25:31forms around the base of the brain. They
1:25:32get a lot of cranial nerve palsies, like
1:25:33cranial nerve six palsy. They get
1:25:35hydrocephalus, and they'll get
1:25:37meningitis signs. And so, that's really,
1:25:39really important to remember. The other
1:25:41thing
1:25:42is that these pathogens can also get
1:25:44into the bone, the vertebrae.
1:25:46And when they get into the vertebrae,
1:25:47they cause an inflammatory reaction
1:25:48there. And when they cause inflammatory
1:25:50reactions there, it causes basically
1:25:52kind of destruction of the bone. And
1:25:54they get all these kinds of like bone
1:25:55destruction and osteomyelitis kind of
1:25:57effect. Sometimes they can cause the
1:25:59bones to fracture, and if they do kind
1:26:01of fracture, it can cause them to
1:26:03displace into the spinal cord. And so,
1:26:07this is actually called Pott's disease
1:26:09when it's involving the thoracic
1:26:11vertebrae. We get something called uh
1:26:14and just in general, the overall
1:26:15vertebrae. We get something called
1:26:17Pott's
1:26:19disease.
1:26:21All right. So, essentially kind of like
1:26:22osteo- TB osteomyelitis.
1:26:25The next thing is it also can again we
1:26:27told you that if you have these
1:26:29mycobacterium and it's in this kind of
1:26:31area of the lung, it can spread via
1:26:33lymphatic channels to get into your
1:26:35lymph nodes. And then from here it can
1:26:37travel up to your cervical lymph nodes.
1:26:39And really cause a lot of inflammation
1:26:41of the cervical lymph nodes. And
1:26:42sometimes they can get really, really
1:26:44enlarged and inflamed. And we call that
1:26:46TB lymphadenitis.
1:26:49And it's pretty common to affect the
1:26:51cervical lymph nodes. So, TB lymph-
1:26:56adenitis. We actually give this a very
1:26:59special name
1:27:01and we call this a scrofula.
1:27:04All right. It's called a scrofula.
1:27:07So, it's essentially more likely that
1:27:09the involvement of the cervical lymph
1:27:10node that we're seeing some kind of
1:27:12inflammation
1:27:14involvement. All right. So, we got the
1:27:17meninges at the base of the brain. We
1:27:18got the actual vertebrae which can cause
1:27:21these kinds of lesions to occur within
1:27:23the bone, inflammation. So, you get
1:27:25basically an osteomyelitis. It can cause
1:27:27fractures. They can displace. They can
1:27:28cause compression of the spinal cord.
1:27:30Here you get enlargement of the cervical
1:27:32lymph nodes.
1:27:33And then another thing is
1:27:35it can actually involve the pericardium.
1:27:38And when it involves the pericardium,
1:27:39it's going to cause inflammation of the
1:27:41pericardium at first. So, it can kind of
1:27:42cause like an acute pericarditis. And
1:27:44so, they usually get kind of an effusion
1:27:46that can occur here. So, pericarditis is
1:27:48almost always to a degree associated
1:27:50with like a degree of a
1:27:51effusion. All right. The problem with
1:27:53this is that TB continues to cause
1:27:56destruction. And eventually repeated
1:27:58bouts of pericarditis can lead to
1:28:00something called constrictive
1:28:02pericarditis. So, when I say that a
1:28:04patient can get pericarditis,
1:28:07I what I really get worried about
1:28:10Oops.
1:28:11is I get really worried about
1:28:13constrictive pericarditis. So, let's
1:28:15actually write this down. Let's call it
1:28:16TB
1:28:18pericarditis. And one of the biggest
1:28:20concerns with this is that yes, it may
1:28:22cause pericardial inflammation. So, they
1:28:23get pleuritic chest pain. They also can
1:28:25have that radiate to the trapezius. On
1:28:28top of that, they get up EKG changes.
1:28:29They get up a pericardial effusion. They
1:28:30could have kind of a scratchy type of
1:28:33heart sounds, which potentially could be
1:28:35present or decreased heart sounds.
1:28:37Either way, they're going to have that.
1:28:39But one of the biggest risks is that if
1:28:40it keeps keeps occurring, it undergoes
1:28:42fibrosis
1:28:43of the pericardium. And then eventually
1:28:45that can cause constrictive
1:28:47pericarditis, which can cause right
1:28:48heart failure. So, that's one thing to
1:28:50remember.
1:28:52The next thing is the TB can also spread
1:28:54and get into the peritoneum. It can get
1:28:57into the peritoneal fluid. And you can
1:28:59get a lot of inflammation of the
1:29:00peritoneum, and you can get some ascites
1:29:02that forms. So, that's another thing. Is
1:29:04not only are you getting
1:29:06um ascites, but you're also getting
1:29:08potentially some thickening
1:29:10of the peritoneum.
1:29:12And what is this here called? This is
1:29:13called TB peritonitis.
1:29:16Again, it's called TB
1:29:19peritonitis. And one of the key things
1:29:20here is this may cause things like
1:29:22abdominal pain, but you're probably
1:29:23going to see a patient who presents with
1:29:24underlying ascites. So, here they'll
1:29:26present with maybe some dullness to
1:29:28percussion, decreased breath sounds in
1:29:30the affected side, pleuritic chest pain.
1:29:31Here, they may have headache. They may
1:29:33have fever. They may have some cranial
1:29:34nerve six palsy. They may have some
1:29:36meningeal signs. Here, they're going to
1:29:38have potentially pain over the
1:29:39vertebrae. So, they're going to have
1:29:40pain over maybe the thoracic spine.
1:29:43It'll be tender to palpation. They may
1:29:45even have some neurological deficits.
1:29:47Here, they're going to have some really
1:29:48significantly enlarged cervical lymph
1:29:50nodes.
1:29:51Here, they can have chest pain. They can
1:29:53have potentially some abnormal heart
1:29:55sounds where it's either diminished or
1:29:57it sounds kind of like a
1:29:59It's like kind of scratching. So, like a
1:30:01friction rub essentially.
1:30:03And if it doesn't get better, it can
1:30:04cause constrictive pericarditis, which
1:30:06can cause heart failure, particularly of
1:30:07the right side. It can spread to the
1:30:09peritoneum and cause acidic fluid
1:30:10accumulation and thickening of the
1:30:11peritoneum. This can cause abdominal
1:30:13pain and overall ascites.
1:30:15On top of that,
1:30:17it can also spread to the adrenal
1:30:19glands,
1:30:21especially the adrenal cortex, and it's
1:30:22usually both the adrenal cortexes, and
1:30:24it causes destruction of the adrenal
1:30:27cortex. When you get destruction of that
1:30:28adrenal cortex, you lose the ability to
1:30:29produce things like cortisol and
1:30:31aldosterone. And essentially, this puts
1:30:34a patient into adrenal failure, which we
1:30:37call Addison's disease. So, this is
1:30:40technically adrenal TB,
1:30:43and adrenal TB is basically a reduction
1:30:45in things like cortisol and aldosterone,
1:30:48which is called
1:30:49Addison's
1:30:51disease.
1:30:53And then lastly, it could also go into
1:30:56the kidneys. You could form these
1:30:57different granulomas within the kidneys,
1:30:59within the ureters, and essentially it
1:31:01causes an inflammatory process that
1:31:03occurs. And inflammation often times
1:31:05causes white blood cells to come to the
1:31:07area.
1:31:08But the problem is is that there's not
1:31:10going to be any kind of culture that
1:31:11grows the typical bacteria that we send
1:31:14off for urine cultures. And so, it'll
1:31:16grow no bacteria. But they'll have white
1:31:18cells, they may even have some blood in
1:31:20the urine, they may even have some
1:31:21symptoms of dysuria. So, you'll test
1:31:23them for urinary tract infection and it
1:31:24won't come with a particular bacteria,
1:31:26but they'll have pyuria, they'll have
1:31:28some signs of some inflammation, they
1:31:29may have some blood in the urine.
1:31:31But you would actually have to have the
1:31:32high degree of suspicion to suspect
1:31:34something like
1:31:36genito
1:31:39urinary TB.
1:31:42So, these are all the different ways
1:31:43that TB can plague our body. What I want
1:31:47us to do now is I want us to take the
1:31:48time to understand when a person gets
1:31:51exposed to TB, when they have scenarios
1:31:54that put them at high risk of
1:31:55progression of the TB, how do I identify
1:31:59what's the best test to to give or to
1:32:01do? How do I know when I do a purified
1:32:03protein derivative? How do I know when
1:32:05to do an interferon gamma release assay?
1:32:07When do I get a chest x-ray? What do I
1:32:08look for in the chest x-ray? If I see
1:32:10the chest x-ray, when what kind of test
1:32:12do I send off for Mycobacterium
1:32:15tuberculosis?
1:32:16And then, what if they present in other
1:32:18areas of the body? How do I know when
Diagnostic Approach to TB
1:32:21I'm going to have those being involved?
1:32:23And how do I test for them? Let's talk
1:32:25about that now. All right, my friends,
1:32:26let's talk about the diagnostic
1:32:27approach. So, when we talk about this,
1:32:29you have to think about the patient who
1:32:30has risk factors for TB. Again, what
1:32:32were they? Do you guys remember? Well,
1:32:33again, the big things for the exposure,
1:32:36the active infection, is going to be
1:32:37travel to or born into an area that has
1:32:39a high prevalence kind of presence of
1:32:43tuberculosis. Asia, Africa, Latin
1:32:45America, right? That's one big one.
1:32:47Another one is crowded settings where it
1:32:49can be spread via those respiratory
1:32:50droplets. Prisons, homeless shelters,
1:32:52those are high prevalence regions or
1:32:53high-risk regions.
1:32:55Healthcare workplaces. Another one is
1:32:57going to be close contact. With then
1:32:59again, a family friend, anybody who has
1:33:01active TB. This is probably one of the
1:33:03highest risk components, okay? So, close
1:33:06contact with somebody who has active TB
1:33:08is probably one of the highest risk
1:33:10components for TB exposure cuz you may
1:33:11get a high inoculum of that
1:33:13Mycobacterium. Now, the other thing that
1:33:15not only controls the infection by TB,
1:33:17which is the exposure component, but the
1:33:20other one is the risk for developing
1:33:22active TB, for it actually progressing,
1:33:24becoming primary progressive, or going
1:33:26out of a latent state into reactivation.
1:33:29What were those?
1:33:30HIV AIDS is going to be a really, really
1:33:31important one. Immunosuppressive
1:33:33medications, one of the common ones that
1:33:35we really get concerned about is
1:33:36TNF-alpha inhibitors. The other ones are
1:33:38transplant recipients. Why? Because
1:33:40they're on usually some type some type
1:33:41of immunosuppressive therapy for kind of
1:33:44like the transplant like rejection meds.
1:33:46The other things could be diabetes,
1:33:48chronic kidney disease, and even
1:33:50silicosis. So, these are some potential
1:33:52risk factors where the patient could
1:33:54progress to an active disease, primary
1:33:56progressive, or come out of the latency
1:33:58and go into reactivation TB. The concept
1:34:00behind this is that again, it's probably
1:34:02some degree of an impaired immune
1:34:04response. So,
1:34:05your T cells are super critical because
1:34:07they're releasing things like interferon
1:34:09gamma. They're also releasing things
1:34:10like tumor necrotic factor alpha. The
1:34:12macrophages are also releasing tumor
1:34:14necrotic factor alpha. All of these
1:34:15things are helping to control your
1:34:16immune response, to generate granulomas,
1:34:18to maintain granulomas, right? So, in
1:34:21patients who have HIV AIDS, they have
1:34:23about a 50-time fold increased risk of
1:34:25developing active TB. Those is because
1:34:29they have reduction in their overall T
1:34:31cell population. So, they have reduced
1:34:32CD4 counts. That reduced CD4 count leads
1:34:35to reduction in in interferon gamma,
1:34:37reduction in tumor necrotic factor
1:34:39alpha, the inability to either maintain
1:34:41or form granulomas may occur.
1:34:44The other component here is the TNF
1:34:46alpha inhibitors. TNF alpha inhibitors,
1:34:48you're going to suppress TNF alpha. If
1:34:49you suppress TNF alpha, you reduce that
1:34:51overall immune response. And so again,
1:34:53you reduce the ability to maintain and
1:34:55form gran- form granulomas. So, that's
1:34:58the concept that I want you guys to
1:34:59think about for that individual who is
1:35:01high risk for exposure. Close contact is
1:35:03a really big one. Born into or travel to
1:35:06an area with a high prevalence regions
1:35:08are going to be the biggest risk factors
1:35:10for exposure. And then HIV AIDS and
1:35:12immunosuppressants are going to be your
1:35:13highest risk factors for that possible
1:35:15infection becoming primary progressive
1:35:18or coming out of latency and going into
1:35:20reactivation.
1:35:21So,
1:35:22that's the particular things for risk
1:35:24factors for exposure and active
1:35:25infection.
1:35:27What would be the potential signs and
1:35:28symptoms of tuberculosis? And do they
1:35:31have any?
1:35:32The big things is pulmonary TB. So,
1:35:35pulmonary TB is likely going to be the
1:35:37most common presentation that you would
1:35:39worry about. This is going to be fever,
1:35:41night sweats, and this is going to be,
1:35:43you know, probably more of a prolonged
1:35:45course of these fever and night sweats.
1:35:47The other one is they can have cough. It
1:35:49could be purulent, especially in the
1:35:50individual with the reactivation TB, or
1:35:53hemoptysis. And this could be due to
1:35:55reactivation TB case creates this kind
1:35:57of liquefactive necrosis of the caseous
1:35:59center and then that kind of erodes
1:36:01through the actual bronchi and it can
1:36:03cause little aneurysms of the pulmonary
1:36:05artery branches. It can erode into the
1:36:07bronchial artery and lead to hemoptysis.
1:36:10The other one is weight loss.
1:36:12Usually this is an unintentional weight
1:36:13loss, usually greater than 10 lb or so
1:36:15within a very short time frame. And
1:36:16again, this is probably because of the
1:36:18cytokine storm. So, cytokine storm,
1:36:20cytokine storm and this is probably due
1:36:22to the destruction of the Mycobacterium
1:36:24tuberculosis, especially in the
1:36:25reactivation stages because of the
1:36:28destruction of the actual bronchial
1:36:30tissue, the alveolar tissue.
1:36:33All right. So, do they have signs and
1:36:34symptoms? No. All right.
1:36:36The next question that you ask is
1:36:38because this is could be a latent TB.
1:36:39And one of the best things about
1:36:40determining latent TB versus no TB
1:36:43is do they have a memory of the actual
1:36:46antigen? All right. So, you need to know
1:36:48do they have memory T cells that if they
1:36:50were exposed to this, they would
1:36:51remember and they would generate in a
1:36:52reaction. The way that we determine that
1:36:55is via what's called interferon gamma
1:36:56release assay and tuberculin skin test.
1:36:59One of the first questions to know which
1:37:01one of those tests you do is did they
1:37:04have the BCG vaccine or not? If they did
1:37:07have the BCG vaccine, that changes
1:37:08things. If they don't, that changes
1:37:10things. So, for example, if they did
1:37:12have the BCG vaccine, we should probably
1:37:14go and do what's called an interferon
1:37:16gamma release assay because
1:37:19if we did the tuberculin skin test, they
1:37:21may have a false response.
1:37:23And that's not what we want. We want to
1:37:25know do they have an exposure component?
1:37:28If they do have an exposure component,
1:37:30they could have latent TB. If they don't
1:37:31have it, then this could be just
1:37:33completely normal patient. The
1:37:35interferon gamma release assay is very,
1:37:37very good test. What we do with this is
1:37:39we're trying to see their response. All
1:37:41right. So, you collect blood from the
1:37:43patient.
1:37:45When you collect this blood, let's say
1:37:46that this patient is infected with the
1:37:48Mycobacterium Tuberculosis. You're going
1:37:50to collect the blood.
1:37:52What's going to happen is is you're
1:37:53going to take from that blood, you're
1:37:56going to basically
1:37:58expose the patient to like very specific
1:38:01types of antigens, all right? Usually
1:38:05this is like two different types of
1:38:06Mycobacterium Tuberculosis antigens.
1:38:09What's going to happen is when they get
1:38:11exposed to it, the macrophage if they
1:38:13you know, they'll take it, express it on
1:38:14its MHC-II complex and take it to a T
1:38:16helper cell. That T helper cell, if it's
1:38:18recognized it with its T cell receptor,
1:38:20it'll generate an immune response. What
1:38:23kind of immune response? It'll pump out
1:38:26what? Interferon gamma.
1:38:29If it pumps out interferon gamma at
1:38:31really high levels above that threshold
1:38:34value, that is what makes us concerned
1:38:36that they have a prior exposure and a T
1:38:39cell memory. And then we can measure
1:38:41that interferon gamma via process called
1:38:43ELISA. Essentially, we use antibodies to
1:38:45tag it, we attach a fluorophore on it,
1:38:48and see if it comes up. If it's no, you
1:38:50can get your tuberculin skin test or
1:38:51your purified protein derivative. This
1:38:53is essentially what you're doing is
1:38:54you're taking and injecting
1:38:55intradermally like 200 like
1:38:58mycobacterial antigens into the actual
1:38:59dermis tissue. What that's going to do
1:39:01is is you're going to kind of expose
1:39:03them to potentially antigens that
1:39:05they've either recognized or they
1:39:06haven't recognized. If they have
1:39:08recognized and they have memory of it,
1:39:09your macrophages, your dendritic cells,
1:39:11they're going to come in, they're going
1:39:11to process them, present them on their
1:39:13MHC-II complexes, take to your T cells,
1:39:15your T cells are going to pump out what?
1:39:17They're going to pump out the interferon
1:39:19gamma, that's going to cause more of a
1:39:20granuloma, and you're going to get a big
1:39:21induration on the skin. And so you
1:39:23should get like a little bump. That bump
1:39:25size is really contingent. In other
1:39:28words, we can set thresholds.
1:39:30And so
1:39:31the smaller it is, we would consider it
1:39:33to be positive in those individuals who
1:39:35are extremely high risk. Do you guys
1:39:37remember the high risk patients? HIV,
1:39:39AIDS, any of of immunocompromised
1:39:41states, and the close contact exposure.
1:39:45That's going to be the ones that if they
1:39:46had any of those potential risk factors
1:39:49and it was greater than or equal to 5
1:39:50mm, I would consider it to be abnormal
1:39:52and that would be a positive test.
1:39:54Now, I could say, "All right, cool. What
1:39:56about 10 mm or greater?"
1:39:59If it's greater than or equal to 10 mm,
1:40:02again, I have to set the threshold cuz
1:40:03generally anything greater than or equal
1:40:05to 15 is positive for anyone. It doesn't
1:40:07really matter, all right? Generally, you
1:40:08just part of your pre-employment
1:40:10screening that's positive, it's anyone,
1:40:11all right?
1:40:12But we may have to lower the size of it
1:40:15to based upon a particular risk factor.
1:40:18Now, it's not the immunosuppressed
1:40:20patient. Now, it's not the close contact
1:40:22exposure with a person with active TB.
1:40:25Now, it's those individuals who
1:40:27probably work in the health care, they
1:40:28work in prison,
1:40:30uh can't they're they're in prison,
1:40:31homeless shelters.
1:40:33They traveled to an area that was, you
1:40:36know, high prevalence of TB. Those are
1:40:38the particular patients I would actually
1:40:40kind of lower that number for, all
1:40:42right? So, greater than or equal to 5,
1:40:44that's for the patients who are
1:40:45extremely high risk. We're lowering the
1:40:47threshold significantly of that size to
1:40:49consider to be positive. 10 or greater,
1:40:52all right, that's for the again, higher
1:40:53risk, but it's going to be more health
1:40:54care workers, prisons, homeless
1:40:56shelters, travel, things of that nature.
1:40:59The time when it's 15 or greater, that's
1:41:01anybody, it doesn't matter. So, anybody,
1:41:03you don't have to have any risk factors
1:41:04exposure, risk factors for active
1:41:06disease. It's just generally these are
1:41:07things that people get done for a part
1:41:08of their pre-employment screening and if
1:41:10it comes back positive
1:41:12at greater than or equal to comes out
1:41:13greater than or equal to 15 mm, that is
1:41:14considered a positive test. And all that
1:41:16means is is that you have memory, you've
1:41:19had exposure to the TB antigen, all
1:41:22right?
1:41:23So, at this point, we have a person come
1:41:25up with a positive interferon gamma
1:41:26release assay, that tells me they have
1:41:28memory. They come up with a positive
1:41:29tuberculin skin test or purified protein
1:41:31derivative, that tells me that they have
1:41:32memory.
1:41:34The next component is is determining is
1:41:36it latent or is it active TB? Because
1:41:38active TB can be asymptomatic, right?
1:41:41Well, all that means is they don't have
1:41:42to present with things like fever, night
1:41:45sweats, weight loss, cough that's either
1:41:48rich in sputum or rich in blood. That
1:41:50doesn't have to be the case. Sometimes
1:41:52they can be completely asymptomatic. So,
1:41:54the question now is do they have any
1:41:56signs of lung tissue destruction that
1:41:59maybe didn't cause symptoms? That's
1:42:01where chest x-ray comes into play.
1:42:04If the chest x-ray is normal or
1:42:06they have like some areas of fibrosis
1:42:09and calcifications that could have been
1:42:11a healed up area, which we call a Ranke
1:42:13complex and all that really is is if you
1:42:15look at this, you can notice that
1:42:17there's a hilar lymph node that looks a
1:42:19little bit calcified and fibrosed and
1:42:21then over here, you probably had a Ghon
1:42:24focus that became calcified as well and
1:42:26fibrosed. That is called a Ranke
1:42:29complex. It's a fibrocalcification of a
1:42:31Ghon complex, which is a Ghon focus and
1:42:34hilar lymphadenopathy, right?
1:42:36So, this would be potentially a sign of
1:42:37healed up area
1:42:39and it's a really common sign for latent
1:42:41TB. So, the chest x-ray could be normal
1:42:43or you could see a healed up area of a
1:42:45Ghon complex. That would be a sign of
1:42:47latent TB, all right? So, latent TB is
1:42:49they usually have a normal chest x-ray,
1:42:51they have no signs of active tissue
1:42:52destruction, but they have memory of TB
1:42:55exposure. All right, the other scenario
1:42:57is you can get an abnormal chest x-ray.
1:42:59So, what this means
1:43:01is it could really look a bunch of
1:43:02different ways, but again, it's it's not
1:43:04going to be normal and you're not going
1:43:05to see a Ranke complex. You're going to
1:43:06see a couple different things. So, for
1:43:07the first one is consolidation. So,
1:43:09you're going to see a consolidated area,
1:43:11especially in primary progressive TB. It
1:43:13really loves to hit the middle and lower
1:43:16lobes. And so, what I'd be looking for
1:43:18is I'd look at this patient, I'd look
1:43:19here and what do I see? I see some
1:43:21opacity here
1:43:22in this particular area, especially with
1:43:24that right lower lobe. If I see a right
1:43:26middle lobe, right lower lobe opacity
1:43:28and they have potential Again, they have
1:43:30memory
1:43:32per se of a T TB exposure. Maybe they
1:43:35have some symptomatology and they have
1:43:37this consolidation. I would start to
1:43:39potentially consider something like a
1:43:40primary progressive TB.
1:43:43The other component here is if I saw
1:43:45hilar lymphadenopathy. So hilar
1:43:47lymphadenopathy in this scenario here,
1:43:49you're going to look look at this. You
1:43:50see a pretty significantly enlarged
1:43:52lymph node and you can see some
1:43:54consolidations over here. This is pretty
1:43:57consistent with a person having again TB
1:44:00findings. This would be more of a
1:44:01primary progressive TB.
1:44:04Apical cavitation is that sign that
1:44:06again it was a person who went latent.
1:44:08They had a Simon focus. It got
1:44:09reactivated. It caused liquefactive
1:44:11necrosis or liquefied the caseous
1:44:14necrotic core and you ended up with this
1:44:16cavitary lesion. And so over here you
1:44:19can notice that there's definitely some
1:44:20weird bronchogenic spread, some
1:44:21opacities, but up here in the top, look.
1:44:24You notice this cavitation. That's
1:44:26pretty consistent with apical
1:44:28fibrocaseous cavities, which is very
1:44:30very consistent with tuberculosis,
1:44:32especially reactivation TB.
1:44:35If you see this one, you should be very
1:44:36scared because this is a part of where
1:44:38it's probably the worst case scenario.
1:44:40The TB has probably gotten into the
1:44:42lymphatic system. It's probably got into
1:44:43the circulation. It's spread all over
1:44:45the body, but it's just spread to
1:44:47multiple areas of the lungs. And these
1:44:49are called diffuse nodular lesions. If
1:44:51you see something like this, this is
1:44:52called miliary TB and the concept behind
1:44:55that is if you look at them, they look
1:44:56like tiny little millet seeds, all
1:44:58right? So this is a very very concerning
1:45:00sign and this would be indicative of
1:45:01pretty significant dissemination or
1:45:04lymphohematogenous spread to all
1:45:06different areas of the lungs and it's
1:45:07probably in extra pulmonary organs.
1:45:09Meaning it could be in the heart. It
1:45:10could be in the brain. It could be all
1:45:11over the place. All right?
1:45:13So if you see these potential signs,
1:45:16this would make you think about active
1:45:18tuberculosis. All right?
1:45:20Now,
1:45:21we got to active TB in what way? They
1:45:24have the risk factors. They didn't have
1:45:26any signs and symptoms. We test to see
1:45:28if they have memory, they do. They don't
1:45:30have an abnormal chest x-ray, latent TB.
1:45:33They do have an abnormal chest x-ray,
1:45:35active TB. What if the patient did have
1:45:37signs and symptoms?
1:45:39And you got the chest x-ray and it
1:45:41showed one of these potential findings.
1:45:43Is that active TB? Yes. Here's the
1:45:46thing, you can have a patient who has
1:45:48active TB, get the tuberculin skin test,
1:45:50get the interferon gamma release assay,
1:45:52and it can give you a false negative.
1:45:53Especially if the patient's extremely
1:45:55immuno-suppressed, we call this energy.
1:45:57They may not have the actual appropriate
1:45:59response to trigger and interferon gamma
1:46:02levels that are really high or cause a
1:46:04granuloma that's going to form
1:46:05underneath the skin
1:46:07in a tuberculin skin test {slash}
1:46:08purified protein derivative test. All
1:46:10right? So, if they have this and they
1:46:13have an abnormal chest x-ray, great. But
1:46:15if they have symptoms and you get the
1:46:16chest x-ray and you find one of these
1:46:17things, that could also lead you to
1:46:19suspect active TB. Now, at this point,
1:46:21this doesn't mean that we have TB. It
1:46:24just means that we have a high suspicion
1:46:25and then we need to confirm it. But what
1:46:28if you had a patient who you got the
1:46:29chest x-ray,
1:46:31they have signs and symptoms, they have
1:46:32all the risk factors, maybe they had
1:46:34memory, maybe they didn't of the actual
1:46:36TB exposure,
1:46:37but you didn't see anything on the chest
1:46:38x-ray. But they are immuno-compromised,
1:46:41they have HIV, they're on TNF
1:46:42inhibitors, you have all of the things
1:46:44that make you can still have a high
1:46:45degree of suspicion and concern that
1:46:48they may have active TB and you're just
1:46:49not seeing it on the chest x-ray. Those
1:46:52are the times you can get a chest CT.
1:46:53Chest CTs are very very sensitive and it
1:46:55can show you a lot of things that you
1:46:57miss on a chest x-ray. Like what? All
1:46:59the same findings, it's just it's going
1:47:01to be way easier to see. You can see
1:47:03consolidation. And again, you would
1:47:05notice here's a pretty obvious
1:47:06consolidation.
1:47:08You can see notice hilar
1:47:09lymphadenopathy. So, if you notice
1:47:11middle lower lobe consolidation with
1:47:14hilar lymphadenopathy, it screams more
1:47:16of a primary progressive TB. And here
1:47:18you can notice that there's a lot of
1:47:19lymphadenopathy here present.
1:47:21If I notice apical cavitation, those
1:47:23fibrocaseous cavities in the upper lobe,
1:47:25this is extremely consistent with
1:47:27reactivation TB. Here's the cavity, and
1:47:29you notice a lot of this inflammation
1:47:31around it, that thick-walled area. All
1:47:33right? Another one is called diffuse
1:47:35nodular lesions. Again, if you saw this
1:47:37in the chest x-ray, and it's you'll be
1:47:39able to see this on the CT scan, but you
1:47:40can notice look at all of that. Millet
1:47:42seeds, diffuse nodular lesions all over
1:47:44the lung. This is very, very concerning
1:47:46for dissemination. So, it's
1:47:48lymphohematogenous spread of the TB
1:47:50throughout In this case, it went to all
1:47:52over the lungs, and it's probably in
1:47:53other areas, extra-pulmonary organs, if
1:47:55you will.
1:47:57The other way that you can find this is
1:47:58called a tree-in-bud pattern. So, this
1:48:00one's also pretty consistent with
1:48:01reactivation TB. So, reactivation TB,
1:48:04look for apical cavitation, look for the
1:48:05tree-in-bud pattern, sometimes the
1:48:07miliary presentation, as well. The
1:48:09primary progressive, you're looking for
1:48:10the consolidation and the uh hilar
1:48:12lymphadenopathy. But, tree-in-bud,
1:48:15apical cavitation, definitely think
1:48:17about the reactivation TB. So, what you
1:48:19would see here is you'll notice
1:48:21something. You'll notice that there's
1:48:22what's like called bronchiectasis, so
1:48:23you'll get some kind of enlarged
1:48:24bronchioles, and you'll notice some
1:48:26exudates are kind of like little
1:48:28inflammatory areas that are outside of
1:48:30it. We call this a tree-in-bud pattern.
1:48:31So, here you're going to have the tree
1:48:33trunk,
1:48:34and then all of these like little bud
1:48:35pieces, that's going to be pretty
1:48:37consistent. And so, this is kind of a
1:48:39sign of endobronchial spread. Um cuz
1:48:42what happens is again, we talked about
1:48:43this on the whiteboard,
1:48:45is when a patient gets TB, especially
1:48:46reactivation TB, they have that
1:48:48liquefied caseous necrosis that kind of
1:48:51erodes its way into the bronchial into
1:48:53the bronchioles. And when you cough, it
1:48:55can then spread or it can move all over
1:48:57the place. So, this is an example of
1:48:58that endobronchial spread, if you will,
1:49:01which comes from reactivation TB. So, if
1:49:04you see any of these types of imaging,
1:49:06whether it's chest x-ray or chest CT,
1:49:09and again, they have signs and symptoms,
1:49:12and they may or may not have positive
1:49:14testing. I mean, interferon-gamma
1:49:16release assay, tuberculin skin test,
1:49:18purified protein derivative. Because if
1:49:19they're severely immunosuppressed, they
1:49:21may have energy. Either way, symptoms
1:49:24and memory, and they don't have energy,
1:49:26and they have imaging, whether it's
1:49:28chest x-ray, chest CT, that would tell
1:49:30you if it's active TB. These two tell
1:49:32you if it's primary progressive. This
1:49:34one here and this one here tells you
1:49:36that it's more likely a reactivation TB.
1:49:38Diffuse nodular lesions is extremely
1:49:40concerning because at this point, we're
1:49:42worried about miliary TB, that this has
1:49:44spread into the blood, into the lymph
1:49:46nodes, lymphatic tissue, and it could be
1:49:48all over the place. And that's a really
1:49:50concerning future.
1:49:52So, with that being said, if I did see a
1:49:54miliary pattern on chest x-ray or CT, or
1:49:58or
1:49:59they presented with extra pulmonary
1:50:01symptoms, meaning that maybe the TB went
1:50:04to another tissue, created a caseating
1:50:06granuloma, and led to symptoms due to
1:50:08that in the actual inflammatory
1:50:10reactions and damage that kind of
1:50:12granuloma caused in that suspected
1:50:14tissue. What would that look like?
1:50:16Well, again,
1:50:17if I see this miliary pattern, I'm
1:50:19already concerned that this is in other
1:50:20areas of the body besides the lungs. So,
1:50:22I'm starting to think, could they have
1:50:23extra pulmonary TB? If they present with
1:50:25symptoms, I start to get me concerned
1:50:26about extra pulmonary TB.
1:50:28So,
1:50:29the question is is what are some of
1:50:31these symptoms, right? So, for example,
1:50:32if they had headache, if they had
1:50:34meningismus, which is kind of like a
1:50:35they they have a hard time being able to
1:50:37kind of flex their neck, right? Or they
1:50:39have a lot of stiffness, rigidity, maybe
1:50:41they had the Brudzinski sign, maybe they
1:50:43had the Kernig's test, they're confused,
1:50:45they have cranial nerve palsies,
1:50:46especially cranial nerve six, where they
1:50:47have difficulty being able to abduct the
1:50:50eye, then you might start to think about
1:50:52potentially TB meningitis. The concept
1:50:54behind why six nerve palsy is super
1:50:56common here is because it loves the base
1:50:58of the brain. So, it likes to get
1:51:00towards like the actual brain stem area.
1:51:02That's where it likes to cause a thick
1:51:03exudate.
1:51:05Pleuritic chest pain, dullness to
1:51:06percussion, decreased breath sounds on
1:51:08the affected side, this is probably a
1:51:10pleural effusion. And TB spread through
1:51:13the lung tissue, especially in scenarios
1:51:15like if they had primary progressive TB,
1:51:17they're usually subpleural that where
1:51:18they they first start off and then they
1:51:20kind of spread. In this case, it could
1:51:22spread through the pleura into the
1:51:24pleural cavity, and they can get TB uh
1:51:26uh what's called TB pleural effusions,
1:51:29right? And so this would be concerning.
1:51:31Another one is if they have chest pain,
1:51:34muffled heart sounds, maybe they have
1:51:35peripheral edema, ascites, hepatomegaly,
1:51:38JVD. This could be signs of
1:51:40pericarditis. And one of the concerning
1:51:42features is is it acute pericarditis or
1:51:44is it potentially constrictive
1:51:46pericarditis?
1:51:47Usually acute pericarditis will cause
1:51:49kind of a a chest pain that changes with
1:51:51position, radiates to the trapezius.
1:51:52They may have kind of a decreased heart
1:51:54sound if they have an effusion. They may
1:51:56have also a pericardial friction rub.
1:51:59And then again, peripheral edema,
1:52:00ascites, hepatomegaly, JVD. This is a
1:52:02patient who probably has had repeated
1:52:04injury and repeated inflammation of the
1:52:06pericardium that it became fibrous and
1:52:09they have constrictive pericarditis. But
1:52:10either I'd be concerned about TB
1:52:12pericarditis.
1:52:14Another one is abdominal pain, ascites.
1:52:17This could be a concern of TB
1:52:18peritonitis.
1:52:20If they have urinary frequency changes,
1:52:22hematuria,
1:52:23you [clears throat] test their urine
1:52:24ends up with a lot of white blood cells,
1:52:26but you get a culture and it shows no
1:52:28types of typical bacteria, it may not be
1:52:30a UTI. This may be genitourinary TB.
1:52:34If you have back pain,
1:52:35>> [clears throat]
1:52:35>> tenderness over the vertebrae, maybe
1:52:37neurological deficits, potentially some
1:52:40weakness, maybe some numbness, some
1:52:41tingling, some paresthesias of the
1:52:43extremities. This could be signs of a
1:52:45potentially osteomyelitis of the bone,
1:52:48which we call Pott's disease, all right?
1:52:51The other thing here is it can cause
1:52:53it can spread to the lymph nodes. So it
1:52:55actually starts off in that hilar lymph
1:52:56node and it can spread to the cervical
1:52:58lymph nodes. And when it gets to the
1:53:00cervical lymph nodes, it can cause a
1:53:01pretty significant caseating granulomas
1:53:03and inflammation there and cause
1:53:04lymphadenitis.
1:53:05And cervical lymphadenitis is pretty
1:53:07common with this one and it can be
1:53:08called a scrofula. Is that something
1:53:10that you may also see?
1:53:13Hypotension, hyponatremia, hyperkalemia,
1:53:15hypoglycemia, and a TB concern is almost
1:53:18always concerning for adrenal
1:53:20insufficiency or TB adrenal TB. The
1:53:23concept behind this is that if you
1:53:24damage the adrenal cortex, you lose the
1:53:25ability to release cortisol. So, that
1:53:27can cause hypotension and it also can
1:53:29cause hypoglycemia. And you also lose
1:53:31the ability to release aldosterone, so
1:53:33that can contribute to hypotension,
1:53:35hyponatremia, and hyperkalemia. So,
1:53:37that'd be concerning for adrenal TB. All
1:53:39right? So, if they have none of these,
1:53:42then what are we thinking? All right.
1:53:44Well, then I'm not really worried about
1:53:45this being extra pulmonary TB. And what
1:53:48I can do is I can say I I have a really
1:53:50high degree of suspicion that they have
1:53:51pulmonary TB.
1:53:52So, I have a suspicion because either
1:53:56couple things.
1:53:57One is they had symptoms.
1:53:59Or they had a positive test and an
1:54:02abnormal chest x-ray. So, they either
1:54:03had symptoms, they had memory, but they
1:54:06had a positive chest x-ray. All right,
1:54:08from there I need to say, do they have
1:54:10sputum that tells me that TB is the
1:54:13cause for these symptoms, abnormal chest
1:54:16x-ray, and weird memory of TB exposure?
1:54:19So, what you do is you get three sputum
1:54:21samples. 8 to 24 hours apart, you have
1:54:22to at least get them kind of preferably
1:54:24in the early morning.
1:54:25When you do that, you're going to obtain
1:54:27all of the sputum and you're going to
1:54:28send it off to a lab and you're going to
1:54:29run a couple different tests on it.
1:54:31The first one that you're going to run
1:54:32is an acid-fast bacilli smear. This one
1:54:35is good because it tells you if you
1:54:36exposed uh if you're exposed to a
1:54:38mycobacterium species. It doesn't tell
1:54:40you if it's mycobacterium tuberculosis,
1:54:42mycobacterium avium, or whatever else it
1:54:45may be. All right?
1:54:47Nucleic acid amplification test is
1:54:48another one that you would do. And this
1:54:50one's pretty great as well because what
1:54:51it's going to do is tell me if they have
1:54:53specific DNA sequences that we have
1:54:56already pre-identified in the past that
1:54:59tells me it's exactly mycobacterium
1:55:01tuberculosis, right? And the last way is
1:55:04we can get what's called a mycobacterial
1:55:05culture. And so we're basically going to
1:55:07collect this, grow this on a specific
1:55:09medium, and it's going to take some
1:55:10time, probably 2 to 8 weeks, but it'll
1:55:12grow out the actual mycobacterium
1:55:14tuberculosis. This would be your gold
1:55:16standard. It just takes a while. So if
1:55:18you had to pick a test, which one would
1:55:20you pick? Well, this one tells me I have
1:55:22mycobacterium, but it doesn't say if
1:55:23it's TB. This one would tell me if I
1:55:25have mycobacterium tuberculosis, but
1:55:27this would be the gold standard. So I'd
1:55:28start off with this as the rapid test,
1:55:30and this would be your gold standard
1:55:31test. So if you have any of those,
1:55:34again, preferably, you have to have at
1:55:35least like one of these two, and then
1:55:37I'd prefer this one overall to determine
1:55:40if the patient has active TB, especially
1:55:42pulmonary, if you're checking it from a
1:55:43sputum sample.
1:55:45Again, what am I trying to get across
1:55:47with this? The point of this is
1:55:48confirming that they have mycobacterium
1:55:50tuberculosis. So if you do the acid-fast
1:55:52bacilli smear, what are you doing?
1:55:54You're looking to see if you try to
1:55:55decolorize, do they decolorize? All
1:55:57right? And all that tells me is if they
1:55:59have lots of mycolic acid, which is
1:56:01common in mycobacterial species. And so
1:56:03they would stay red. They wouldn't take
1:56:06on that bluish color whenever you give
1:56:08them the counterstain of the methylene
1:56:10blue. But it doesn't tell me if it's
1:56:11mycobacterium tuberculosis, it just
1:56:12tells me it's mycobacterium.
1:56:14The nucleic acid amplification test is
1:56:16we're literally taking the bacteria,
1:56:19we're extracting out the DNA, we're then
1:56:21going to amplify it, and then we're
1:56:23going to see if we test it, and we
1:56:24actually know the specific DNA sequences
1:56:27that are present in mycobacterium
1:56:28tuberculosis, is it present? And if it
1:56:31is, and we have this proper connection,
1:56:33boom, we'll confirm that this is
1:56:35mycobacterium tuberculosis based upon
1:56:37the DNA sequences. And the other benefit
1:56:39of this
1:56:41is because you can test those DNA
1:56:42sequences, you can determine if the
1:56:44patient is susceptible to the common
1:56:47antibiotics that we give them, or
1:56:49antimycobacterials that we give them, or
1:56:52if they're not, and we have to give like
1:56:53more of the multi-drug resistant type of
1:56:55like antibiotics. All right? So that's
1:56:57the other benefit of that. The culture
1:56:59is the gold standard, though. It's just
1:57:01the downside is it takes a long time for
1:57:03this thing to grow. And so, you'll have
1:57:05to wait a while, but if you get this
1:57:07coming back, it is going to be the most
1:57:09definitive that the patient has
1:57:11Mycobacterium tuberculosis. All right?
1:57:14So, that's the beauty of this is that it
1:57:15gives you two things. One is it
1:57:17diagnoses it, and the second thing is
1:57:19between these two
1:57:21is it actually helps you to determine
1:57:24do they have a resistant strain or not?
1:57:26Will they respond to rifampin, to
1:57:28isoniazid, or will I have to use
1:57:30different types of drugs? All right? If
1:57:33they did have that miliary pattern, the
1:57:34diffuse nodular lesions, I'm concerned
1:57:36it's all over the place.
1:57:37If they have any extra pulmonary
1:57:39symptoms, or if they have both of those,
1:57:40I'm concerned that this is all over the
1:57:42place.
1:57:43So, then I got to start thinking a
1:57:43little bit more. And then I may have to
1:57:45do an organ-specific workup and test
1:57:47those areas. Test the fluid, test the
1:57:50tissue in those areas, and do all these
1:57:52same test. It's just not going to be
1:57:54from a sputum sample, maybe from a fluid
1:57:56sample, it may be a tissue biopsy, but I
1:57:59got to go through the same steps. But I
1:58:01got to find the extra pulmonary TB
1:58:03first. So,
1:58:05let's say that I have a concern that
1:58:06they have TB meningitis. Well, what I
1:58:07do? I get a CT head. What I told you is
1:58:10it loves the base of the brain. And
1:58:12you're going to get meningitis, and it
1:58:13loves to attack this area right here.
1:58:15So, it chalks up all the arachnoid
1:58:17villi. It causes a communicating
1:58:18hydrocephalus. So, you would notice the
1:58:20thick exudate here, and then you notice
1:58:22some enlargement of the ventricles. Here
1:58:23we have enlargement of the third, we
1:58:25have enlargement of the lateral, and we
1:58:26have enlargement of the fourth
1:58:27ventricle. So, this is a pretty
1:58:28consistent to see hydrocephalus and kind
1:58:30of a basal meningeal enhancement cuz it
1:58:32had caused a thick exudate there in that
1:58:34base of the brain. All right? If that's
1:58:36the case, I'm going to get an LP,
1:58:38send it off and see if it comes up again
1:58:40with what? Well, the preliminary test is
1:58:42I check glucose. All right? I'll check
1:58:45also my types of cells. So, I'll see if
1:58:47they have any white blood cells or
1:58:48lymphocytes. I'll check
1:58:51the glucose, I'll check the ADA, and
1:58:53I'll check the proteins. And ADA is a
1:58:55really good marker because it helps to
1:58:57identify the possibility of
1:58:59tuberculosis, right? So, again, from
1:59:02here, I'm going to tap in, collect some
1:59:03samples, send it off to the lab, and
1:59:06when I do that, my goal is to see if it
1:59:07comes up with some characteristic signs.
1:59:10So, what are those signs? Again, the big
1:59:12thing is high protein.
1:59:13They're going to have low high
1:59:15lymphocytes, low glucose, and they're
1:59:17going to have a high ADA, right?
1:59:19Adenosine deaminase. And this is kind of
1:59:21one of those like little tests that I'd
1:59:22say is the most important out of this
1:59:24fluid sample. From here, out of all
1:59:27these things, what I then need to do is
1:59:29I need to confirm the pathogen. This
1:59:31doesn't tell me if I have TB. So, what
1:59:32do I do?
1:59:33I get all those mycobacterial tests,
1:59:35right? And I do all of those things like
1:59:37the nucleic acid amplification test. I
1:59:39do the mycobacterial culture, maybe the
1:59:41acid-fast bacillus smear, right? TB
1:59:44pleural effusion. Based [clears throat]
1:59:45upon that, what am I going to do? Well,
1:59:47if I haven't already, I'll get a repeat
1:59:48image and I'll take a look and see if I
1:59:50can find if there's any pleural
1:59:51effusion. And if I see a pleural
1:59:52effusion like this, look, I mean, come
1:59:54on. That's a That's a pleural effusion
1:59:55if I've ever seen one, right? There's a
1:59:56good costophrenic angle here. Ain't none
1:59:59there. That's pretty consistent with a
2:00:00pleural effusion. In that scenario,
2:00:02especially in this one, I got to tap it.
2:00:04I got to test the fluid. If I test the
2:00:06fluid, you're probably going to see a
2:00:07lot of the same things. You may see,
2:00:09you know, high amounts of protein, you
2:00:10may see potentially high amounts of LDH,
2:00:12you may see potentially
2:00:14high amounts of lymphocytes, and maybe
2:00:17even a low glucose. But what's the big
2:00:18thing that I'm looking for? If I tap
2:00:20into this, I collect the fluid, I say,
2:00:22"Let me send this off to the lab." I may
2:00:24see lots of proteins, I may see
2:00:25lymphocytes, I may see ADA. And again,
2:00:28you may even see low glucose, too. But
2:00:30the ADA is the precursor that says,
2:00:33"Ooh, my pretest probability of TB is a
2:00:35little bit higher. Let me send this off
2:00:37to test them for, again, nucleic acid
2:00:39amplification test, the acid-fast
2:00:41bacillus smear, the mycobacterial
2:00:43culture." All right?
2:00:44TB pericarditis You're get the point
2:00:46here. TB pericarditis, what am I going
2:00:47to do? Well, in these scenarios,
2:00:49probably an echo is going to be the best
2:00:50thing cuz it's going to give me an idea
2:00:51if they have a pericardial effusion.
2:00:53That's probably the first thing I'd be
2:00:54looking for, especially in acute
2:00:55pericarditis. If I see that effusion,
2:00:57that's concerning. But guess what? It
2:00:59gives me an opportunity to stick a
2:01:00needle in there and test it and say,
2:01:02"Oh, there's some fluid." I get that
2:01:05fluid. I send it off to the lab and what
2:01:07am I looking for? Probably you're going
2:01:08to have lots of proteins. Probably
2:01:10you're going to have lots of
2:01:10lymphocytes. You may have low glucose.
2:01:12But what are you looking for? It's the
2:01:14ADA. That's the precursor. That pretest
2:01:16probability is up. I'm going to send it
2:01:18to get the testing. Yeah, I hope you're
2:01:19getting the point. Uh
2:01:21if you didn't, guess what? We're going
2:01:22to do it again. TB peritonitis, they
2:01:23have ascites. What's probably the best
2:01:25test here? Well, I could do a I could do
2:01:27a CT scan. I could do an ultrasound of
2:01:29the abdomen. But again, I need imaging
2:01:30to see if I have any evidence of
2:01:32ascites. And so, if I see the ascites, I
2:01:34see the peritoneal thickening here, all
2:01:36this dark material is going to be the
2:01:37ascites and then that thick layer around
2:01:39this is the thickened peritoneum. That's
2:01:41pretty consistent with a peritonitis.
2:01:43What do I got to do? Tap into the
2:01:44ascites. When I do the paracentesis,
2:01:46what am I going to do? Send off the
2:01:47fluid. If I get all that fluid tested,
2:01:50what am I looking for? Well, dude, yeah,
2:01:52if I tap in and I go ahead and cat-
2:01:54collect this and send it off, I'm
2:01:55probably going to see lots of
2:01:55lymphocytes.
2:01:57I'm probably going to see lots of
2:01:57proteins.
2:01:59I'm probably going to see maybe a lower
2:02:00glucose. The SAG ratio, which looks at
2:02:02your your um your ascites albumin
2:02:05gradient, anything less than 1.1 pretty
2:02:07much always concerns you for an
2:02:09exudative process rather than a portal
2:02:12hypertension-related
2:02:13process, right? And so, exu- exudative
2:02:15is almost always a concern for things
2:02:17like malignancy.
2:02:18So, at that point, malignancy or in this
2:02:20case, TB is another big one. But SAG
2:02:23less than 1.1 means it's not portal
2:02:24hypertension-related. And plus, I'm
2:02:26going to have probably lots of
2:02:26lymphocytes, protein, low glucose. But
2:02:29again, what's the key thing? The ADA.
2:02:31That's the the litmus test to say, "Ooh,
2:02:33let me send this off for mycobacterial
2:02:34TB workup."
2:02:36All right. That's the That's That's that
2:02:37part. Genital urinary TB is a really
2:02:39weird one. This is a person who came in
2:02:41for that hematuria. maybe they have some
2:02:42frequency in their urination, maybe they
2:02:44have some dysuria. You get a urine
2:02:46sample,
2:02:47you get a culture, it all comes back
2:02:50relatively like, you know, non-specific.
2:02:52So, they they have some pyuria, right?
2:02:54So, white cells in the urine. They have
2:02:56some hematuria. Maybe their leukocyte
2:02:58esterase and nitrites are maybe
2:03:00elevated, maybe they're kind of fine.
2:03:02But, the key thing here is you get the
2:03:03culture and it's not positive for any
2:03:05typical bacteria because Mycobacterium
2:03:07has to grow in a specific medium. So,
2:03:10you would have concerns of what seems
2:03:12like a UTI, but they don't have any
2:03:13bacteria to prove it.
2:03:15You might start them on antibiotics,
2:03:16etc., but it may not get any better.
2:03:19You do the CTU, which is a CT urogram.
2:03:21And what you're looking for is any
2:03:22evidence of granulomas. And so, in this
2:03:24patient, if we look here on their right
2:03:26kind of kidney,
2:03:28we notice that they have this hypodense
2:03:29collection and they have some
2:03:31calcifications here. That's kind of
2:03:33consistent with potentially a granuloma
2:03:34there. All right, same thing. That would
2:03:36make me think that there's a possibility
2:03:38they have a granuloma due to TB in the
2:03:41kidney. So, what do I need to do? Well,
2:03:42I'm going to probably collect a sample,
2:03:44probably from their urine. Sometimes, if
2:03:46I need to, I can do a biopsy. But, what
2:03:48I'm going to do is I'm going to send it
2:03:49off for the mycobacterial TB workup. All
2:03:52right?
2:03:53I hope that you guys get the point. This
2:03:54is what you're going to do with all the
2:03:55fluids, all right? But, what if I don't
2:03:57take it from a fluid, I take it from a
2:03:59tissue? I got to confirm it. So, I'm
2:04:01going to do the acid-fast bacillus
2:04:03smear. I'm going to go ahead and do the
2:04:04nucleic acid amplification test. I'm
2:04:06going to do the mycobacterial culture.
2:04:08And if they all come up positive, it's
2:04:10going to confirm my presence of
2:04:12extrapulmonary TB. All right?
2:04:14Now, again, the benefit of doing all of
2:04:17these cultures, as I already told you,
2:04:19it's determining if they have it, but it
2:04:21also gives you guidance onto is the the
2:04:24actual Mycobacterium TB resistant to
2:04:27your classic drugs that we're going to
2:04:29give them like rifampin and isoniazid.
2:04:31If it is, we have to change up the type
2:04:33of antibiotic. And we'll get get that
2:04:35later.
2:04:36All right. What if this isn't a fluid
2:04:38and said it's more of a solid tissue?
2:04:40Well, then we may need to biopsy, right?
2:04:41So, in spinal TB something of Potts
2:04:43disease, you get an MRI. If anybody has
2:04:45back pain, neurological deficits,
2:04:46vertebral tenderness, and they have a
2:04:48suspicion of TB, I'd probably get an
2:04:49MRI. When you do that, you're going to
2:04:51look for vertebral body destruction and
2:04:53maybe even spinal cord compression. So,
2:04:54you look at the I don't want to go too
2:04:56crazy in the radiology aspect here, but
2:04:58this is a T1 image. And with this
2:04:59[snorts] T1 image, you're looking for
2:05:01areas of anatomy with a darker area, so
2:05:03hypointensities. And so, I can kind of
2:05:05appreciate this. There's some
2:05:05hypointensity here, here, here, here.
2:05:09There's even some over here. There's
2:05:10some here. The The thing is all over the
2:05:12place, right?
2:05:14And then I'm going to look at the T2.
2:05:16When I look at the T2, you're looking
2:05:17for hyperintensity. And this is again
2:05:19areas of edema, inflammation that you're
2:05:20looking for. And so, a little bit of
2:05:22white here, um some white down here,
2:05:26white here, a lot of white in that disk
2:05:27space. There's some white outside here,
2:05:30white outside here. All right, so that's
2:05:32some areas of again edema, inflammation,
2:05:35possible disease processes on the T2.
2:05:37The best thing is looking at the T1 post
2:05:39contrast. And that's going to show a lot
2:05:41of enhancement. Um and so, here I can
2:05:43notice a significant amount of white
2:05:45here, here in the vertebral bodies,
2:05:47going into the disk, going outside of
2:05:49the spinal cord, um over here. This is
2:05:53probably a cold abscess, potentially,
2:05:54but
2:05:55this is all signs of again inflammation
2:05:58um in that rim enhancement. So, this is
2:06:00pretty concerning and consistent with
2:06:02someone who probably has potentially
2:06:03some disease process or inflammation,
2:06:06destruction of the vertebrae, the
2:06:09paraspinal areas.
2:06:11Um and then on top of that, guess what
2:06:12else I noticed? Because of all of this,
2:06:14it's squeezing
2:06:15on the spinal cord in every single one
2:06:17of these, right? So, I have the cold
2:06:18abscesses right there, but then I also
2:06:20notice all of this spinal cord
2:06:22compression.
2:06:23So, this is pretty consistent with like
2:06:24some spinal TB or Potts disease. And
2:06:27this would again, in this scenario, what
2:06:28would I mainly need to do? I probably
2:06:30have to go in and biopsy this. And so,
2:06:31you may need to do some type of CT
2:06:32guided or FN ultrasound guided a bone
2:06:35biopsy. Take a tissue. Once you take
2:06:37that tissue, you're going to have to
2:06:38send it off and actually be tested. Do
2:06:40the acid-fast bacilli smear. Do the
2:06:41nucleic acid amplification test. Do the
2:06:44mycobacterial culture. And you may even
2:06:45do histology on it to see if you find
2:06:47caseating granulomas.
2:06:49If you have the patient with a scrofula,
2:06:51right, something like this,
2:06:53then what you may have to do here for
2:06:54that is you may have to do again a lymph
2:06:55node biopsy. You can do excisional. You
2:06:58can do FNAs. Again, I kind of think it
2:07:00depends on these potential scenarios.
2:07:01Biopsies are always going to be best.
2:07:02But if you did one of these, you're
2:07:04going to take that tissue sample. And
2:07:05what are you going to do? You're going
2:07:06to send it off to the lab. Because once
2:07:08you send it off, you're going to test it
2:07:09for acid-fast bacilli smear, nucleic
2:07:11acid amplification test, mycobacterial
2:07:12culture, and histology. All right.
2:07:15Adrenal TB. In this potential patient,
2:07:17you're going to be having the signs.
2:07:19What would you do? I'd probably get
2:07:20imaging. I'd look to make sure I don't
2:07:21have like a tumor. I don't have
2:07:22something going on where they're kind of
2:07:24like hemorrhaging. They have
2:07:25Waterhouse-Friderichsen syndrome. I'm
2:07:27going to get some imaging. So, I'll get
2:07:28some type of like adrenal insufficiency
2:07:30workup with imaging. I'll check their
2:07:31cortisol. I'll check their aldosterone.
2:07:34I'll even probably check their sodium,
2:07:35their potassium, all those things. And
2:07:36again, we talked about it. Low cortisol,
2:07:38high ACTH tells me that this is a
2:07:41primary adrenal insufficiency. Cuz low
2:07:43cortisol is coming from what?
2:07:46It's coming from the adrenal gland. Low
2:07:47cortisol should tell the pituitary to do
2:07:49what? Make more ACTH. That's the
2:07:51reflexive response. That tells me that
2:07:53this is coming from the adrenal gland.
2:07:55Right? They're going to have low sodium,
2:07:56high potassium because of low
2:07:58aldosterone. All right. And the glucose
2:07:59is going to be low because of the low
2:08:02cortisol. You get the adrenal CT, you
2:08:04get the adrenal MRI, and you'd see some
2:08:06bilateral adrenal enlargement. It's
2:08:07probably some calcificating lesions. And
2:08:09so, the adrenal glands are normally
2:08:11difficult to find. But here, you can
2:08:12actually see this one on the left side a
2:08:14little bit more so than on the right
2:08:15side. But you see some calcifications
2:08:17and a little bit more enlargement, I'd
2:08:18say, on the left than so than the right.
2:08:20But that's some bilateral adrenal
2:08:21enlargement with definitely some heavy
2:08:22calcifications that would make me
2:08:24concerned. And TB loves both. If it
2:08:26causes adrenal insufficiency, you
2:08:28usually get bilateral adrenal
2:08:29destruction.
2:08:30All right. So, then I would have to
2:08:32biopsy it, and guess what I'm going to
2:08:33do with that biopsy? I'm going to send
2:08:34it for an acid-fast bacillus smear. I'm
2:08:36going to send it off for
2:08:38uh a nucleic acid amplification test,
2:08:40mycobacterial culture, and histology to
2:08:42see if there's caseating granulomas.
2:08:44>> [laughter]
2:08:45>> So, you guys get the point. I'm doing
2:08:46all of these things to prove that TB is
2:08:49somewhere else, and that's where those
2:08:51tests come into play. Again, that's
2:08:53still the same process. The only thing
2:08:55that's different is I take some actual
2:08:56tissue and I look at it under the
2:08:57microscope. And I want to find caseating
2:09:00granulomas. And so, this is a little bit
2:09:02excessive. This is probably more for
2:09:03your step one, your basic MCQs, but here
2:09:06you can notice that there's this lot of
2:09:07this caseous necrotic center, and then
2:09:10outside of it you're noticing some of
2:09:11these Langhans giant cells. And that's
2:09:14kind of just telling me that I have,
2:09:15again, signs of caseating granulomas.
2:09:18All right.
2:09:19So, that is the way that I would prove
2:09:21that the patient has extrapulmonary TB.
Treatment of TB
2:09:24Man, that was a lot, right? But again, I
2:09:27hope you guys get the point out of all
2:09:28of this that this is really trying to
2:09:30kind of teach your mind to think about
2:09:32TB in a couple different ways, which is
2:09:35latent is they have the memory, but they
2:09:36don't have the imaging that supports
2:09:38active disease.
2:09:39Active, it could be pulmonary, it could
2:09:41be extrapulmonary. Active TB, if it's
2:09:43pulmonary, again, you're looking for
2:09:45either memory or symptoms plus imaging
2:09:47that suggest it.
2:09:49If they have extrapulmonary, if they
2:09:50have miliary TB, it probably is
2:09:52somewhere else. If they have
2:09:53extrapulmonary symptoms, you got to find
2:09:55where it is and then test it to see if
2:09:57it's in those places. If it's not in
2:09:59other places and you're concerned that
2:10:00it's in the lungs, you got to take
2:10:01sputum and collect that and see if it
2:10:04comes up positive for the Mycobacterium
2:10:06tuberculosis species. All right.
2:10:08Now, when we confirm that a patient has
2:10:10TB, it's important to determine if it's
2:10:11latent or active. Latent tuberculosis is
2:10:15treated with things like rifampin, and
2:10:17you can do that by itself for about 4
2:10:19months. That's probably one of the
2:10:21common ones that we utilize a lot of.
2:10:23Another option
2:10:25is isoniazid, all right? And you can
2:10:27give it with rifampin, so then you could
2:10:29drop the time frame down to about 3
2:10:30months, all right? The only thing that
2:10:32you want to do is anytime you give
2:10:33isoniazid, it can cause pyridoxine or B6
2:10:36deficiency, and that can lead to
2:10:38neuropathy. And so we give pyridoxine
2:10:40with this empirically to reduce that
2:10:42risk of neuropathy. But again, you can
2:10:43drop your time down by 3 months since
2:10:45you're giving two drugs.
2:10:47Another option is you can actually do
2:10:49isoniazid. You can do rifapentine, which
2:10:51is just basically it's like an it's a
2:10:53rifamycin, it's an alternative to
2:10:55rifampin. And then on top of that, you
2:10:57can again give the pyridoxine because
2:10:59anytime you give isoniazid, you usually
2:11:00give pyridoxine to reduce that B6
2:11:02deficiency-related peripheral
2:11:03neuropathy. This one you can also do it
2:11:06for 3 months, but the benefit of this
2:11:08one is that you can do it weekly. But
2:11:11usually you need to This is for a person
2:11:13that you're kind of concerned with
2:11:14adherence, and usually there needs to be
2:11:15direct observation that they're getting
2:11:17it. Um so this is an alternative as
2:11:19well.
2:11:20Another one that we can do is isoniazid
2:11:22by itself. The only downside about that
2:11:24is that again, you're going to have to
2:11:25give it with the pyridoxine to reduce B6
2:11:27deficiency-related neuropathy, but this
2:11:29one you have to be on a little bit kind
2:11:30of like longer, all right? So you may
2:11:32have to be on this for 6 months,
2:11:33sometimes 9 months. And so that's the
2:11:36downside of this one. This one used to
2:11:38be the pretty common one that we would
2:11:39give is isoniazid for 6 to 9 months with
2:11:41pyridoxine or rifampin daily for 4
2:11:44months. That used to be the pretty
2:11:45common regimens that we would kind of
2:11:46abide by. So asterisk here tells me the
2:11:48which ones we usually would go off of on
2:11:50the exam.
2:11:51This was just a little bit extra to kind
2:11:53of go into a little bit more detail
2:11:54about other opportunities. This one is
2:11:56going to be pretty good cuz you can do
2:11:58weekly, so it's going to be preferred,
2:11:59but you need direct observation therapy
2:12:01to assume that they're doing this one.
2:12:02So there's a lot that we talked about
2:12:04here, right? If you don't remember any
2:12:05of this, that's okay. Latent, rifampin
2:12:07for 4 months or isoniazid for 6 to 9
2:12:09months, all right? That's really the big
2:12:11thing to remember. If you wanted to take
2:12:12it to the extra step, you could think
2:12:14about it like this. For those who have
2:12:16contraindications to rifamycins,
2:12:18rifampin, or rifapentine, what that
2:12:21tells me is I probably can't give them
2:12:23something that has these in it. I can
2:12:25probably only give them isoniazid, all
2:12:27right? If that's the case. So, what
2:12:29would that be? It's drug interactions.
2:12:30Usually people who have HIV medications,
2:12:34um maybe they're on um like a blood
2:12:36thinner of some sort, like warfarin or
2:12:37an anticoagulant of some sort, which is
2:12:39interacting with a cytochrome P450
2:12:41system. Rifamycins alter the cytochrome
2:12:44P450 system. They're inducers.
2:12:46And so, because of that, they could
2:12:47reduce the efficacy of other drugs that
2:12:50are being taken with it. And that is
2:12:52concerning. And so, because of that, we
2:12:54may not want to give that drug to this
2:12:56patient. And if they do have that,
2:12:59that's probably where isoniazid is going
2:13:00to be your go-to.
2:13:02If they don't, you could probably just
2:13:04stick with saying rifampin and you're
2:13:06done. But, if you wanted to take it to
2:13:07the ninja nerdy level, that's when we
2:13:09kind of get a little bit more and we
2:13:11say, "Are you worried that they're even
2:13:13going to take their medication?" All
2:13:15right?
2:13:15If you are, go with this option, because
2:13:18you need direct observation and plus,
2:13:20they're not going to have to take it
2:13:21daily. They can come in weekly. You give
2:13:23them a pill, you watch them, all right,
2:13:24go up. I'll see you next week. That's a
2:13:27good option, all right?
2:13:29The other one is do they have things
2:13:30like HIV? Are they really young?
2:13:33If that's the case, then we prefer to go
2:13:35with the rifampin and again, isoniazid
2:13:38with the B6, all right?
2:13:40If it's not, you can probably just go
2:13:42with rifampin for 4 months. Again, if
2:13:44you don't want to remember all of this,
2:13:46you could just say, "Do they have a
2:13:46contraindication to rifamycins?" Yes, go
2:13:49with the isoniazid, it'll just be
2:13:50prolonged. If they don't, you can
2:13:52probably just go with rifampin for 4
2:13:54months, all right? If you wanted to
2:13:55remember this extra stuff, cool. But,
2:13:57that's what I want you to remember for
2:13:59latent TB. The reason why you're
2:14:01treating latent TB is not because
2:14:02they're contagious, not because they
2:14:03have active like disease going on.
2:14:05You're trying to knock this bacteria out
2:14:07and eradicate it completely. And that's
2:14:09the goal here. It may be dormant, but
2:14:12there's always the possibility in the
2:14:13future that it could reactivate. And so,
2:14:15we're trying to reduce that reactivation
2:14:17risk and eradicate the pathogen in
2:14:19general.
2:14:20Now, active TB is they either have
2:14:22already reactivated or they progressed
2:14:24from their primary infection. All right,
2:14:26and they have consolidation, highly
2:14:27lymphadenopathy, or they have
2:14:29reactivation with the apical
2:14:30cavitations. All right? They're causing
2:14:32active disease or it's other areas of
2:14:35the body. It's already in the brain,
2:14:36it's in the pleura, it's in the
2:14:37pericardium, it's in the peritoneum,
2:14:39it's in the kidneys, it's in the ureter,
2:14:41it's all over the place. Now, we have to
2:14:43change up our regimen. Rifampin by
2:14:45itself, isoniazid [clears throat] by
2:14:47itself, ain't going to cut it. We have
2:14:50to be more aggressive. And we're going
2:14:52to combine a bunch of different drugs up
2:14:54front. And so, we give rifampin.
2:14:56We can also give isoniazid.
2:14:59We give pyrazinamide.
2:15:01And we give ethambutol. [clears throat]
2:15:03All right, so this is called the RIPE
2:15:04regimen. You're going to do all four of
2:15:05these drugs for at least two months.
2:15:08Then after that, you're going to go to
2:15:10just two of the drugs, which is just the
2:15:12R and the I. So, then you'll go to
2:15:14rifampin and isoniazid for another four
2:15:17months. This is the standard. All right,
2:15:19so in most case scenarios, it's RIPE
2:15:22regimen, all four of them for two
2:15:24months, and then rifampin and isoniazid
2:15:26for the remaining four months. All
2:15:28right? So, two, four, that's a total of
2:15:30six months that you're going to be on TB
2:15:32medications, right? Now, the things that
2:15:35you need to tell the patient of is when
2:15:37you start these medications, there is
2:15:39possible side effects that you need to
2:15:40watch out for. If they come back saying,
2:15:43"I'm dying because I noticed that my
2:15:45tears are red and I'm peeing red-orange
2:15:47color." You need to tell them that's a
2:15:49normal process to have red-orange tears.
2:15:51So, rifampin, red-orange tears, and
2:15:54make sure that you let them know it revs
2:15:55up the liver. All right? So, it's a
2:15:57cytochrome P450 inducer. What that tells
2:16:00you is that you need to let them know,
2:16:01"Hey, we got to be careful
2:16:03if you're on warfarin, if you're on HIV
2:16:05medications, we might have to check
2:16:07those medications and be very, very
2:16:08careful because this could reduce the
2:16:11efficacy of those drugs. And so, you may
2:16:13need to check their INR more carefully.
2:16:14You may need to be able to modify some
2:16:16of their warfarin, modify their HIV
2:16:18medications, etc. All right?
2:16:21Isoniazid, I want you to tell them watch
2:16:23out for isolated nerves to become angry.
2:16:25So, peripheral neuropathy. How do you
2:16:27prevent this? Giving them pyridoxine.
2:16:30Pyrazinamide, watch out for a pyramid of
2:16:33uric acid that can cause things like
2:16:35gout. It can increase the risk of uric
2:16:37acid stones like nephrolithiasis. And
2:16:39so, pyrazinamide, watch out for gout or
2:16:42hyperuricemia. All right?
2:16:45E, watch out for the eyes to be damaged.
2:16:48So, optic neuritis. They may have
2:16:49changes in their vision, uh particularly
2:16:52the color component of their vision. And
2:16:54so, this is one that you may need to do
2:16:55annual eye exams keeping an eye very,
2:16:57very closely on their eyes and making
2:16:59sure that you stop this at any point
2:17:00time if they have any signs of optic
2:17:02neuritis cuz they could lose their
2:17:03vision. All right? So, these are really,
2:17:05really critical, but I'm going to take
2:17:06it to the next level. I want you to
2:17:08remember not just those things about
2:17:10REST IN PEACE liver. So, rifampin,
2:17:13isoniazid,
2:17:14and pyrazinamide. Pyrazinamide's
2:17:16actually the most toxic to the liver,
2:17:19but these will put that liver in the
2:17:20ground. They can cause hepatotoxicity.
2:17:23All right? And so, that's why it's
2:17:25really critical for you to be monitoring
2:17:27these patients' LFTs when they're on
2:17:29these drugs. All right?
2:17:31So, that's what I want you to take away
2:17:32from that.
2:17:33So, latent If you don't remember all the
2:17:36other stuff, that's okay. If they have a
2:17:37contraindication to being on rifampin,
2:17:39give them isoniazid for 6 to 9 months.
2:17:41If they don't, give them rifampin for 4
2:17:42months.
2:17:44If they have active TB, all right? RIPE
2:17:46regimen for 2 months. Write rifampin,
2:17:48isoniazid for 4 months, a total of a
2:17:516-month period. Watch out for these side
2:17:53effects that are all present. Keep an
2:17:55eye on them. Monitor the things
2:17:57appropriately. All right?
2:17:59If you want to take it to the next
2:18:00level, we can.
2:18:02So, in patients who have active TB, you
2:18:04first want to know cuz this is the
2:18:06standard, right? This is the standard.
2:18:09But, what if you got that mycobacterial
2:18:10culture, the nucleic acid amplification
2:18:12test, and it showed that they're
2:18:13resistant to rifampin or isoniazid? Can
2:18:16you give them this? No. And because of
2:18:19that, you need to give different types
2:18:21of drugs. I'm not going to go down that
2:18:23kind of rabbit hole, but I want you to
2:18:25understand that the RIPE regimen
2:18:26followed by rifampin and isoniazid may
2:18:28not happen for every single patient if
2:18:31they have resistance to those particular
2:18:33drugs. If they don't, great. RIPE
2:18:36regimen, 2 months. What you do is once
2:18:38you start the RIPE regimen,
2:18:40eventually sometime into it prior on
2:18:42month one, and then again later on month
2:18:44two, you're going to test the sputum
2:18:46cultures. You want to see if they're
2:18:48actually starting to clear the
2:18:50mycobacterium.
2:18:52If you do that, and you check their
2:18:54sputum cultures, and you're again
2:18:56watching out for them and maybe even
2:18:57getting a chest X-ray, you need to know
2:19:00is the actual mycobacterium being
2:19:02cleared. All right?
2:19:04If the mycobacterium
2:19:06uh cultures are still positive
2:19:08consecutively, two times in a row, and
2:19:11their chest X-ray showed re-
2:19:13reactivation TB, which means that they
2:19:14have apical cavitation,
2:19:17you can't continue rifampin and
2:19:18isoniazid for only 4 months. We got to
2:19:21go longer.
2:19:23And sometimes we may go 7 months. We may
2:19:25extend that time frame out. So, two
2:19:28positive cultures while they're on the
2:19:29RIPE regimen, and they have reactivation
2:19:31TB initially, or they have cavitary
2:19:33lesions, you extend it out, and it's
2:19:35going to be a total of 9 months. So,
2:19:37it's going to be 2 months of RIPE
2:19:40and uh 7 months of rifampin and
2:19:42isoniazid. If the cultures are negative,
2:19:45you don't have any chest X-ray with the
2:19:46cavitation, or maybe you did, but it
2:19:48doesn't matter because you don't have
2:19:50positive cultures. You can go with the
2:19:52rifampin, the isoniazid for the 4
2:19:54months.
2:19:55That's the way that's taking it just to
2:19:57the extra levels. You're going to be
2:19:58checking their sputum cultures and
2:19:59looking at their chest x-ray to see if
2:20:01they have cavitation. Positive cultures,
2:20:03cavitation, extend it an additional time
2:20:06frame, and you're going to go a total of
2:20:089 months. So, it's 2 months, 7 months.
2:20:11If they don't have positive cultures,
2:20:14maybe the chest x-ray shows cavitation
2:20:15or not, doesn't matter cuz they don't
2:20:17have two positive consecutive cultures,
2:20:19you only have to do the rifampin and
2:20:21isoniazid for 4 months. All right.
2:20:24The only thing I want to add is is in
2:20:25patients who have active TB,
2:20:28this is talking about pulmonary TB and
2:20:31extra-pulmonary TB with just small
2:20:33little exceptions. In patients who have
2:20:35TB meningitis or they have Potts
2:20:37disease, we have to extend it just a
2:20:39little bit longer because this is in
2:20:41some sensitive areas that we have to
2:20:42give established time and penetration of
2:20:45that drug. And so, sometimes they may be
2:20:47on it for 9 months to an entire year.
2:20:50So, that's one other thing I will add.
2:20:51That's the only other little addition
2:20:52for extra-pulmonary TB is if it's
2:20:54meningitis or Potts disease, we may have
2:20:56to go a little bit longer than your
2:20:58standard 6 months. You may have to go 9
2:21:01to 12 months.
2:21:03The other component here is in TB
2:21:05meningitis and TB pericarditis, we have
2:21:07noticed a reduction in neuro disability
2:21:10from TB meningitis, and we also noticed
2:21:12a reduction in developing constrictive
2:21:15pericarditis if we added on
2:21:16dexamethasone to their RIPE regimen and
2:21:19rifampin and isoniazid regimen. All
2:21:21right? So, that's really important to
2:21:22remember. RIPE regimen followed by the
2:21:24rifampin and isoniazid for the 6-month
2:21:26duration, that's standard across the
2:21:27board except in TB meningitis and Potts
2:21:30disease, we may go 9 to 12 months. And
2:21:32if they have TB meningitis and TB
2:21:33pericarditis, we'll give them
2:21:34dexamethasone or some kind of steroid to
2:21:37reduce neuro disability in meningitis
2:21:39and to reduce the risk of constrictive
2:21:41pericarditis in TB pericarditis.
2:21:44All right.
2:21:45Man, we talked about a ton of stuff with
2:21:49TB. And man, I really hope that you guys
2:21:51feel comfortable after this. I feel like
2:21:52you feel I hope you really feel like you
2:21:53know it and you feel confident and
2:21:55capable of taking on any aspect of it.
2:21:58And if you guys do, you guys know what
2:21:59to do. Hit the like button, comment down
2:22:00in the comment section, subscribe, tell
2:22:01other people about it. But I just hope
2:22:03that this got you one step closer to