- clinical response criteria: in patients initially presenting with three classical symptoms (weight loss, chronic cough, fever or night sweats), clinical improvement should be recorded in at least two of three symptoms at least 4 weeks apart; in patients with only two of these symptoms present initially, patients should show improvement in at least one symptom, at least 4 weeks apart; and in addition, patients should not develop clinical deterioration - i.e., on-going weight loss, or increased cough, or new-onset fever or night sweats. In addition, the attending physician should ascertain an overall clinical beneficial response to treatment. Transient deterioration of chest radiographic abnormalities might be explained by a paradoxical inflammatory response, and this may therefore not necessarily be interpreted as treatment failure; such decision depends on consensus with the Data Safety Monitoring Board; evidence of improvement on chest x-ray.