Microbiology case study. A 53 y/o female recently emigrated from Pakistan to the
ID: 48940 • Letter: M
Question
Microbiology case study.
A 53 y/o female recently emigrated from Pakistan to the U.S. She presented with a skin disease thought to be caused by a bacterium, however all skin bipsy cultures using media-based techniques failed to grow anything. You order microscopy of the skin biopsy and see bacilli, but the Gram stain comes up inconclusive. Given her hsitory, you order an acid-fast stain of the biopsy, which helps you nail the cause.
I found out the bacterium is mycobacterium tuberculosis, so my question is:
If you wanted to, how might you try to grow the etiological agent?
Explanation / Answer
It is pathogenic bacterial species , can be isolated in labs and stored at -80 degree , one way to culture is to collect samples of mononuclear cells in the peripheral blood samples from a healthy human donor , it has very simple growth requirement and is able to grow slowly in harsh conditions.