Comparative evaluation of the AdvanSure Mycobacteria GenoBlot assay and the GenoType Mycobacterium CM/AS assay for the identification of non-tuberculous mycobacteria.

In this study, to assess the performance of the AdvanSure Mycobacteria GenoBlot assay (AdvanSure assay), we compared its performance with that of the GenoType Mycobacterium CM/AS assay (GenoType assay) for the identification of non-tuberculous mycobacteria (NTM). Twenty-four reference strains and 103 consecutive clinical NTM isolates were analysed. The accuracy rates for the 24 reference strains were 87.5 and 95.8 % for the AdvanSure and GenoType assays, respectively. For the 103 clinical isolates, a 91.3 % (94/103) concordance rate was observed between the two assays. The majority (7/9) of discrepancies were isolates identified as Mycobacterium avium complex (MAC) by only the AdvanSure assay. All of these isolates except one were confirmed as MAC by sequence-based typing. The AdvanSure assay showed comparable performance to the GenoType assay and can be useful as a routine method for NTM identification in the clinical setting, especially where MAC is the main cause of NTM infection.