Performance of host blood transcriptomic signatures for diagnosing and predicting progression to tuberculosis disease in HIV-negative adults and adolescents: a systematic review protocol.

One-quarter of the global population, including the majority of adults in tuberculosis (TB) endemic countries, are estimated to be This systematic review will involve conducting a comprehensive literature search of cohort, case-control, cross-sectional and randomised-controlled studies of the performance of host blood transcriptomic signatures for TB diagnosis and prediction of progression to TB disease. We will search Medline via PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science and EBSCO libraries, complemented by a search of bibliographies of selected articles for other relevant articles. The literature search will be restricted to studies published in English from 2005 to 2018 and conducted in HIV-uninfected adults and adolescents (≥12 years old). Forest plots and a narrative synthesis of the findings will be provided. The primary outcomes will be sensitivity, specificity, as well as true/false positives and true/false negatives. Heterogeneity resulting from differences in the design, composition and structure of individual signatures will preclude meta-analysis and pooling of results. Ethics approval is not required for this systematic review protocol. The results of this review will be disseminated through a peer-reviewed journal as well as conference presentations. CRD42017073817.

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© Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2019. Re-use permitted under CC BY-NC. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.

Déclaration de conflit d'intérêts

Competing interests: TS and AP-N are inventors of blood transcriptomic signatures of risk of TB.