X-rays and finally the isolation of the guilty bacteria from a patient's sputum.

ECONOMIST: A poor diagnosis

Does it make any difference that my sputum is yellowish or greenish?

CNN: Pleurisy

On a telephone conference call yesterday, he pointed out that it takes two or three weeks for doctors to see if the TB germ will grow to detectable numbers in a lab dish containing sputum from a suspected patient.

NPR: TB Traveler Exposes Diagnosis Problems