Recent diagnosis Bronchiectasis with presumptive MAC

Posted by antheak @antheak, Feb 25 6:39am

Hi, Thanks for accepting me here. I had a recent diagnosis of Bronchiectasis after over 10 years of chronic cough with mucus.
Learned about airway clearance a few years ago and recently had sputum result of MAC but the second results states Presumptive Mycobacteria. Does anyone know what that means, the specialist says it takes 12 weeks to get the result but how can it be presumptive after 8 weeks.?

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Sue, Volunteer Mentor | @sueinmn | Feb 25 9:47am

@antheak It sounds as if they have isolated mycobacteria, but are not sure which one it is yet. Mycobacteria cultures can take a very long time to grow, and only a few labs are capable of doing the final testing - down to which strain (some do not need to be treated) and if it needs treating, which antibiotics will work on it. I would take the term "presumptive" as a very good sign - meaning it probably hasn't grown a huge amount of bacteria yet. This would mean a very low level oof infectious matter. Did you give more than one sputum specimen for testing? If so, it is possible only one of them grew mycobacteria - which does not meet the standard for treating in most cases, as it could represent an accidental contamination of one vial or slide.

Please don't let all of this worry you - Mycobacteria are very slow-growing, so a few weeks or even months delay in treatment is usually not critical.

Twelve weeks seems to be long though - where are you located?

antheak | @antheak | Feb 25 11:19am

Hi Sue, Thanks for your reply, I am from Devon UK but was living next to a river and a dusty vehicle track in france for the previous 15 years. I had one sputum result showing MAC and the following month did two more, both of these are still showing presumptive M.
I have Broncial nodules showing on the CT. Hopefully going to speak to the specialist tomorrow but I think he is going to just leave it by the way communication has gone. I want it to be negative but if not I would like to know obviously. They have given me a nebulizer with the 7% saline which helps.