Est-il justifié de traiter par antibiotiques les infections pulmonaires à mycobactéries non tuberculeuses ?

Nontuberculous mycobacteria (NTM) infections have an increasing incidence. These NTM are opportunist pathogens. That is why NTM isolation is not a synonym to infection. Scientific societies have tried to determinate some criteria for infection. The current infection criteria have been published in 2007. They are association of radio-clinical criteria and microbiological criteria. The most important criteria are that NTM infection should be an exclusion diagnosis. When diagnosis is established, treatment is not systematic. It is important to do the balance between benefit (symptoms improvement) and risks. Indeed, over treatment exposes to drugs toxicity. Treatment is long (12 months after culture conversion) and difficult (at least 3 antibiotics). Moreover, the optimal treatment is unknown. That is why only very symptomatic patients have a real benefit of treatment. Finally, NTM infection is only an exclusion diagnosis. But, if clinician decides not to treat, he has to follow patient as this patient could secondly need a treatment. All these data should be considered by any clinician who cares for a patient with an NTM infection. Thus, initialing a treatment is not trivial, not to treat either.