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Contacts:
Phone: +91-44-283 696 00
Dr S Siva Kumar
(shanmugamsiva@nirt.res.in)
Dr Padmapriyadarsini C
Supranational TB Reference Laboratory in Chennai, India
Address:
ISMR-National Institute for Research in Tuberculosis
No.1, Mayor Sathiyamoorthy Road,
Chetpet, Chennai - 600 031,
INDIA
Services provided by the SRL
Routine activities of the lab include diagnosis of TB by smear microscopy, culture and drug susceptibility testing for patients under clinical trials and referral cases. In addition, the department has carried out drug resistance surveillance studies for estimating the prevalence of resistance to first line and second line drugs in the community. As a Supranational Research laboratory under WHO and as one of the National reference laboratory of the country, NIRT monitors five states & five Union Territories for External Quality Assurance (EQA) smear microscopy & Culture, DST of M. tuberculosis and provides support for PMDT (Programmatic Management of Drug-resistant TB) services in terms of second Line DST for MDR suspects.
The laboratory performs the following tests: Sputum Smear Microscopy, mycobacterial culture by solid and liquid, Drug susceptibility testing by Solid and liquid culture, Line probe assay, Genexpert. Presently our lab is building up its facility for whole genome sequencing for Mycobacterial strains.
Current links and partnerships outside of SRLN
NIRT is in the process of establishing the memorandum of understanding with the Royal Centre for Disease Control, Department of Public Health, Bhutan, for studying the epidemiology of the Tubercle strains circulating in Bhutan.
Description
The National Institute for Research in Tuberculosis a permanent institute under the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), is an internationally recognized institution for Tuberculosis (TB) research. Recently, an International Centre for Excellence in Research (ICER) in collaboration with NIH was established at the Centre.
NIRT is a leader in randomized controlled clinical trials of treatment of pulmonary TB and extra‐pulmonary TB treatment trials, socio‐behavioural studies, epidemiological studies, operational research studies, bacteriological and molecular studies, pharmacokinetics and pharmacogenetics, functional genomics, immunogenetics, immunodiagnosis, cellular immunity all aimed at prevention and control of TB and its consequences. The Bacteriology department is one of the largest facilities of its nature and serves as a WHO Supra‐national reference laboratory for South‐East Asian countries. It also functions as a national reference laboratory for RNTCP.
Structure and organization
Additional information:
Research activities
NIRT is a world‐recognized leader in randomized controlled clinical trials of treatment of pulmonary TB, extra‐pulmonary TB treatment trials, socio‐behavioural studies, epidemiological studies, molecular epidemiology, operational research studies, bacteriology methods, pharmacokinetics and pharmacogenetics, molecular biology, diagnosis using molecular tools, functional genomics, immunogenetics, immunodiagnosis, cellular immunity, and capacity building.
NIRT has substantial experience in moleculer biology and epidemiology. Using genotyping methods like RFLP with repetitive element IS6110, spoligotyping and MIRU typing (Mycobacterial Interspersed Repeat Elements), NIRT has demonstrated that 1) TB strains are genetically highly diverse varying in virulence and transmission; 2) the majority of TB cases are from an already infected pool (endogenous reactivation); 3) a high percentage (40%) of IS6110 single copy strains of M. tuberculosis are present in southern India highlighting the limitations of IS6110‐based fingerprinting; 4) mixed infection with more than two strains simultaneously growing from a clinical isolate are possible
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