Clinical manifestations of pulmonary and extra-pulmonary tuberculosis

The clinical manifestations of tuberculosis are dependent on a number of factors: age, immune status, co-existing diseases, immunization status to the bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG); virulence of the infecting organism and host-microbe interaction. Before the advent of the HIV epidemic, approximately 85% of reported tuberculosis cases were pulmonary only, with the remaining 15% being extra-pulmonary or both pulmonary and extra-pulmonary sites [1]. One large retrospective study [2] of tuberculosis in patients with advanced HIV infection reported: Pulmonary involvement alone 38%, Extrapulmonary sites alone 30%, Both pulmonary and nonpulmonary 32%