Chest Radiography

• Chest radiography is a sensitive but nonspecific test to screen for active TB disease.


• A TB diagnosis cannot be established by radiography alone as the chest X-ray will reveal abnormalities of the lungs that may be due to a disease process other than TB. Reliance on the chest radiograph as the only diagnostic test for TB may result in both over-diagnosis and under-diagnosis of TB. (Ref.)


• Persons without HIV infection and normal chest radiographs do not require further bacteriological testing for pulmonary TB and hence chest radiographs have great value as a screening test rather than a diagnostic test.


• Exposure to radiation should be considered, if radiographic examination is to be used frequently for individual patients.

New technologies are being developed that include automated reading of digital chest radiography and can be used to rapidly identify people in need of further TB testing even without a trained radiologist. (Ref.)