what is auramine testing and why is it used on gastic aspirate?

Question

i have been searching for the last hour and have googled, wikipedia-ed and everything else in between and i can't find out what auramine testing is and why it is used on gastric aspirate. help? please reference answers if possible

Answer 1

Auramine is auramine O (au·ra·mine O) (aw´rə-mēn) a yellow fluorescent dye used to stain acid-fast bacteria and DNA and as a component of the Truant auramine-rhodamine stain for tubercle bacilli.

It is usually done to check for tuberculosis if the person hasn't coughed up enough sputum for the microbiologists to test.