Levofloxacin, the active l-isomer of the quinolone ofloxacin, is now widely accepted for treatment of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis. Because the drug is now widely used, we sought to establish susceptibility test conditions for Mycobacterium tuberculosis against levofloxacin by the traditional reference method, agar proportion (AP), the commonly used BACTEC 460 radiometric system, and the newer BACTEC MGIT 960 method. To determine the stability of levofloxacin in the two newer test systems (BACTEC 460 and BACTEC MGIT 960), media containing subinhibitory levels of levofloxacin were prepared and stored at 4 and 37 degrees C for 14 days. The stored media were inoculated with H37Rv, and the drug activity was compared to freshly prepared media. Results show that levofloxacin is stable over the course of testing. Next, optimum levofloxacin test concentrations were determined for AP, BACTEC 460, and BACTEC MGIT 960 methods. MICs were determined for 32 pan-susceptible isolates of M. tuberculosis obtained from presumably untreated patients and 14 quinolone-resistant isolates. The levofloxacin-resistant strains either were isolated from patients who remained culture-positive despite treatment with a quinolone agent (six strains) or contained known mutations in gyrA (eight strains). Levofloxacin MICs resulted in a bimodal pattern with values for resistant strains consistently higher than those for pan-susceptible strains. Results show that levofloxacin concentrations of 2 microg/ml (BACTEC 460 and BACTEC MGIT 960) and 1 microg/ml (AP) inhibited the growth of all pan-susceptible strains while permitting the growth of all levofloxacin-resistant strains. Confirmatory tests with a subset of pan-susceptible and levofloxacin-resistant isolates validated the selected test concentrations.
