Facial mask can be useful not only as protection from the spread of the coronavirus, but as a cheap way to take the analysis for tuberculosis. It is reported in the article published by scientists from the London infectious hospital Homerton in the British medical journal The Lancet.
In a preliminary study, scientists have studied the samples collected from 44 patients in whom tuberculosis had already been diagnosed previously. Six patients in the mask analysis was able to detect tuberculosis, which was not revealed by conventional radiography, but only after more studies.
As stated in the published material, the sampling, the mask “is an interesting and innovative approach.”
This solution is primarily aimed at assistance to developing countries, where the population has no opportunity to pay for an expensive survey. This leaves a number of questions: how long should wear a mask to settled is necessary for the normal study the amount of material. Ideally, the patient should sleep with the mask all night, but you can’t remove it, otherwise the picture will be distorted. However, to spend the night without hitting the mask, is quite difficult. Now doctors are studying whether there is enough will, for example, to wear a mask one hour to collect sufficient material.
According to the who, worldwide in 2018 fell ill with TB of 10 million people. Mortality in 2018 amounted to 1.5 million people. However, about three million people are unable to obtain qualified medical assistance.
