To investigate the value of interferon-gamma release assays (T-SPOT.TB) in bone and joint tuberculosis.

A retrospective study of 127 suspected cases of bone joint tuberculosis in bone surgery in our hospital from January 2016 to March 2018 was conducted to analyze the diagnostic performance of T-SPOT.TB, and to compare the positive rate of tuberculosis in different bone and joint parts, and at the same time compared efficiency of the early secretory antigen target 6 (ESAT-6) and culture filtrate protein 10 (CFP-10) in diagnosing osteoarticular tuberculosis.

The accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictive value of T-SPOT.TB were 86.61% (110/127), 83.33% (35/42), 88.24% (75/85), 77.78% (35/45) and 91.46% (75/82), respectively. There were no significant differences of positive rate of T-SPOT.TB among the groups (χ²=1.72, P>0.05). The positive rate were 69.04% and 61.90% when using ESAT-6 and CFP-10 assays (χ²=0.27, P>0.05), while combination of of ESAT-6 and CFP-10 as diagnostic markers made the positive rate increase to 83.33%, higher than that using single one (χ²=4.16, 7.11, P<0.05).

T-SPOT.TB has important application value in the diagnosis of bone and joint tuberculosis and deserves clinical promotion.