Evaluation of Agar-Based Medium with Sheep Sera for Testing of Drug Susceptibility of Mycobacterium tuberculosis to Isoniazid, Rifampin, Ethambutol, and Streptomycin

Abstract

The performance of sheep sera instead of sheep blood in agar-based media was investigated for susceptibility testing of Mycobacterium tuberculosis against primary drugs. The levels of agreement between agar-based medium supplemented with sheep sera and the proportion method on Middlebrook 7H11 agar as the reference method for determining susceptibility to isoniazid (INH), rifampin (RIF), ethambutol (EMB), and streptomycin (STR) were 98.4, 98.4, 95.3, and 100%, respectively.