The purified protein derivative (PPD) skin test for tuberculosis may be positive or negative after getting the bacille calmette-guerin (BCG) vaccine. When the BCG vaccine causes the PPD to be positive, the typical pattern is for the initial PPD to be positive. Over time the PPD may become negative. Your daughter
Here's a link that may answers your question:
http://www.fwcc.org/TB_BCG.htm
Tuberculosis Testing and the BCG Vaccine
Excerpt:
"The BCG vaccine does not protect completely against pulmonary
tuberculosis (tuberculosis in the lungs). Instead, it protects children from the complications of tuberculosis, which include spread to the kidneys and spinal fluid surrounding the brain.
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In the United States health care providers use a simple skin test called the PPD (purified protein derivative) to test for exposure to tuberculosis.The test is interpreted by measuring the amount of this induration. For a child or adult born in a developing nation, a measurement of 10 millimeters (mm) is considered to
be the sign of a significant, or positive exposure to tuberculosis. The child should then have a chest x-ray to rule out pulmonary tuberculosis. If the physician finds no evidence of active disease, children should then be started on a medication called Isoniazid, which needs to be taken daily for the next nine months. This prevents the tuberculosis germ, already in the body (but not yet causing disease) from becoming active and
resulting in serious illness. Isoniazid sometimes causes liver toxicity in adults, but is considered to be a very safe medication in children. It is important that the treatment with Isoniazid not be interrupted for the whole nine months, as this could result in the germ becoming resistant to the antibiotic. Physicians may need to be reminded that Isoniazid may interact with other medications. Children with a positive PPD test and
negative chest x- ray have only been exposed to the tuberculosis germ, and are not contagious to other children or adults in the same way that infected adults are contagious (so they do not need to be excluded from day care or school)."
Does her doctor know that she had the BCG vaccine? After someone receives this vaccine, they will ALWAYS test positive on a PPD skin test.
Make sure the doctor knows she had the vaccine. Usually, if the chest xray is negative, the patient will simply be watched with more xrays to be sure they are not infected with pulmonary TB.
Good luck! My husband also had theBCG vaccine, and had a PPD skin test that was very positive. Then he told the doctor he had received the vaccine, and the matter was dropped after he had a few negative chest xrays.
When immigrants apply for citizenship in the US, if they have received BCG vaccine in their past, they only have to have a chest xray, not a PPD test as is required of all other immigrants.
her doctor know she had the BCG vaccine but he said she had inffected
thanks
nado