EVALUATION OF THE EFFECTIVENESS OF A COMMON HOUSEHOLD DISINFECTANT AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM TUBERCULOSIS

ABSTRACT: Tuberculosis a disease affecting the lungs caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis is considered endemic in the Philippines,With the advent of a more preventive approach to health, various products now available in the market claim to have bactericidal action against all common germs.One of which is Domex said to be "all around cleaner, capable of killing 99.9% of household germs". The research aim to evaluate this claim.Mycobacterium tuberculosis pure isolate was obtained from Research Institute of Tropical Medicine. Colonies were obtained and 0.9% NSS was added to make a solution for subculture. Ten Bactec tubes were inoculated with 0.5 ml each of the NSS solutions were divided into 3 sets . Set A contained the inoculum with 0.5 ml of Domex, whereas Sets B and C were inoculated with 1 ml and 1.5 ml of Domex respectively. A single Bactec medium serves as a control for Mycobacterium growth. The cultures were incubated and readings wre taken at 2 days intrval. Tube A1 (Mycobacterium inoculate with 0.5 ml Domex) yielded positive GI numbers whereas tubes A2, A3 and tubes from sets B and C gave our negative results. Results of Bactec tests are GI numbers.The GI number is representative of the CO2 aspirated from the est vialsindicative of bacterial growth. GI numbers between ) - 10 are representative of negative cultures whereas higher numbers are representative of positive cultures. To confirm the positive results, samples from tubes A1, A2, and A3 were taken and smeared from acid fast bacilli. A1 showed positive acid fast bacilli while A2 and A3 yielded no bacilli.Samples were obatained from the tubes set B and C, both sets gave out negative results After a six weeks observation period, negative results were confirmed. Based on the confirmation, it is therefore concluded that Domex is and effective bactericidal agent against Mycobacterium tuberculosis.

Department of Community & Family Medicine