Outcome of standardized treatment for patients with MDR-TB from Tamil Nadu, India.

Background & Objectives: Programmatic management of MDR-TB using a standardized treatment regimen (STR) is being implemented under the Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP) in India. This study was undertaken to analyse the outcomes of MDR-TB patients treated at the Tuberculosis Research Centre, Chennai, with the RNTCP recommended 24 months STR, under programmatic conditions.

Methods: Patients failed to the category II re-treatment regimen and confirmed to have MDR-TB, were treated with the RNTCP's STR in a prospective field trial on a predominantly ambulatory basis.

Increased yield of smear positive pulmonary TB cases by screening patients with > or =2 weeks cough, compared to > or =3 weeks and adequacy of 2 sputum smear examinations for diagnosis.

Background: RNTCP recommends examining three sputum smears for AFB from Chest Symptomatics (CSs) with cough of > or =3 weeks for diagnosis of Pulmonary TB (PTB). A previous multi-centric study from Tuberculosis Research centre (TRC) has shown that the yield of sputum positive cases can be increased if duration of cough for screening was reduced to > or =2 weeks. Other studies have shown that two smear examinations are adequate for diagnosis of smear positive PTB .