The menace of tuberculosis and the role of nuclear medicine in tackling it. Now its time to tighten the loose strings.
Tuberculosis is a global medical problem. The radioisotopes have played an important role in the diagnosis and treatment of many problems including various cancers. In the early period after the discovery of radioactivity, isotopes or radionuclides like radium were used for the treatment of tuberculosis (TB) but they failed completely. Later, nuclear medicine has developed techniques for sensitive and rapid detection of TB. Many of the currently applied molecular biology techniques of nuclear medicine find applications in diagnostic research of TB. Still, the detection of lesions of unknown origin, the differentiation of active from inactive TB lesions and also the response to treatment, especially in cases of drug resistant TB are the main fields that need better approaches for identification by nuclear medicine techniques.