Bronchiectasis is a structural abnormality of the airways. Instead of tapering smoothly like the branches of a tree as they move from the central area of the chest to the edge of the chest, the airways enlarge and this disrupts the normal clearance mechanisms in the lung that protect us from things we inhale that shouldn't be there. The bronchiectasis makes it more likely that environmental organisms like nontuberculous mycobacteria (or NTM) stick to the airway walls instead of being cleared out and cause problems. So the NTM cause a chronic infection in the airways, which may make bronchiectasis, a structural problem, worse.

So the NTM is found by sputum or ct?? I am really confused between the two but seem almost similar. I thought bronchiectasis is a cause for chronic infection also.

hi - bronchiectasis is a condition that makes you prone for other lung illnesses - as it is explained to me by my drs. its like having a petri dish in your lungs waiting to catch and grow out any bacteria, virus, fungus that is inhaled - without having normal clearing of mucus things tend to grow in the mucus - I have leaned a lot about things that may contribute to getting an ntm infection, but there is a lot of uncertainty among advice, but I now wear a mask when I garden, my all time joy, I do little of it now, I changed out my shower head with an all metal one with large drops of water, no fine mist, ntm's seem to love plastic in shower heads - never do I walk where there are sprinklers on (I have water repellent masks also) - I finally convinced my husband to turn the water heater up, that was a hard one! - hope I helped some - norma