Evidence map›Paper›PMID 41040987›Full record

ArticleFrontiers in cellular and infection microbiology2025

Optimization of decision thresholds for Mycobacterium tuberculosis can effectively improve the performance of mNGS in tuberculosis diagnosis.

Yuecui Li, Lili Zhang, Guannan Ma, Chenghang Li, Weiyue Hu, Ruotong Ren, Yinghui Zang, Dandan Ying, Shuai Qiu, Shuyan Jin and 2 more

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Frontiers in cellular and infection microbiology, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
2citing papers in PubMed, 1 pooled it
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

2 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.

  1. Pooled it
  2. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

12 authors.

Yuecui Li *Department of Infectious Disease, The First People's Hospital of Yongkang, Affiliated to Hangzhou Medical College, Jinhua, China.
Lili Zhang *Department of Infectious Disease, The First People's Hospital of Yongkang, Affiliated to Hangzhou Medical College, Jinhua, China.
Guannan Ma *Zhejiang Key Laboratory of Digital Technology in Medical Diagnostics, Hangzhou, China.
Chenghang LiDepartment of Infectious Disease, The First People's Hospital of Yongkang, Affiliated to Hangzhou Medical College, Jinhua, China.
Weiyue HuDepartment of Infectious Disease, The First People's Hospital of Yongkang, Affiliated to Hangzhou Medical College, Jinhua, China.
Ruotong RenMatriDx Biotechnology Co., Ltd, Hangzhou, China.
Yinghui ZangDepartment of Infectious Disease, The First People's Hospital of Yongkang, Affiliated to Hangzhou Medical College, Jinhua, China.
Dandan YingDepartment of Infectious Disease, The First People's Hospital of Yongkang, Affiliated to Hangzhou Medical College, Jinhua, China.
Shuai QiuDepartment of Infectious Disease, The First People's Hospital of Yongkang, Affiliated to Hangzhou Medical College, Jinhua, China.
Shuyan JinDepartment of Infectious Disease, The First People's Hospital of Yongkang, Affiliated to Hangzhou Medical College, Jinhua, China.
Chunjie QiuDepartment of Infectious Disease, The First People's Hospital of Yongkang, Affiliated to Hangzhou Medical College, Jinhua, China.
Xuefang CaoMatriDx Biotechnology Co., Ltd, Hangzhou, China.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Background: Pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) diagnosis remains challenging due to limitations in traditional methods. This study aimed to optimize the metagenomic next-generation sequencing (mNGS) threshold for Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex (MTBC) detection and evaluate its efficacy compared to standard diagnostic approaches. Methods: A total of 264 bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) samples were collected from patients with suspected pulmonary TB at Yongkang First People's Hospital between January 2022 and June 2023. After excluding patients with incomplete data, 59 clinically confirmed TB patients and 111 with non-tuberculous conditions were enrolled. mNGS data were analyzed to calculate reads per million (RPM) for MTBC, and thresholds of 0.02, 0.05, and 0.10 RPM were evaluated for diagnostic efficacy using clinical diagnosis as the gold standard. Results: The area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve (AUC) for mNGS in diagnosing TB at RPM thresholds of ≥0.02, ≥0.05, and ≥0.10 were 0.881, 0.873, and 0.814, respectively. The optimal detection threshold was found at RPM ≥ 0.05. Comparative analysis showed mNGS (AUC = 0.873) outperformed routine culture (0.718), PCR (0.741), and Xpert (0.763). Combining mNGS with these methods improved AUC values to 0.837, 0.868, and 0.873, respectively. Conclusion: Optimizing the mNGS threshold to ≥0.05 significantly enhances MTBC detection in pulmonary TB. Combining mNGS with traditional methods further improves diagnostic efficacy, suggesting a potential role for mNGS in clinical TB management.

Indexed as

High-Throughput Nucleotide SequencingMetagenomicsMycobacterium tuberculosisTuberculosis, PulmonaryAdultAgedBronchoalveolar Lavage FluidFemaleHumansMaleMiddle AgedROC CurveSensitivity and SpecificityYoung Adultbronchoalveolar lavage fluiddiagnostic efficacymetagenomic next-generation sequencingthreshold optimizationtuberculosis

Identifiers

PMID41040987
PMCPMC12485630

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.