@carriew I'm totally on board with your reluctance to treat your Mom! At 86, just her age would seem to be a huge barrier to successful treatment, then you add her other ailments...

Let me just say that my Mom had Bronchiectasis form a lifetime in the paper industry and was diagnosed with NTM (called MAI back in 2010) at age 83. She had a number of other conditions of aging, and the doctors didn't even suggest antibiotic therapy - they just continued her nebs and "daily cough exercise" and treated her exacerbations (every 3-4 months) with azithromycin for 10 days, and she would improve for a while. She died at the end of 2011 of conditions completely unrelated to her BE or MAC. The last year was difficult enough - I was treated for MAC and Pseudomonas myself in my 60's and I cannot imagine that she would have survived the regimen with any quality of life whatsoever.

Maybe you can discuss your Mom's situation with her primary doc or with a palliative care specialist, and get their recommendation. Remember, the ID doc's focus is cure infections, the pulmonologist's is to improve lung function - neither may be well-focused on the bigger picture of overall quality of life.