Publications by authors named "Valentina A Alarcon"
Article Synopsis
- Tuberculosis is becoming more common in Latin America, partly because more people are going to prison, with the number almost quadrupling since 1990.
- A study looked at how this rise in incarceration has helped spread tuberculosis and found that it caused a lot more cases than expected.
- If countries reduce the number of people admitted to prison and the time they spend there, it could help lower tuberculosis cases by more than 10% by 2034.
Article Synopsis
- The study investigates the role of private health-care providers in tuberculosis (TB) detection and management in Lima, Peru, highlighting a lack of understanding in Latin America about their involvement.
- It includes a mix of quantitative patient pathway analysis and qualitative interviews with private providers, revealing that 77% of patients sought care initially at private facilities with diagnostic capabilities.
- Findings suggest that while private providers see themselves as offering quicker services, issues with referral systems and a lack of public sector recognition for private tests hinder collaborative TB treatment efforts.
Background: Globally, >30 000 children fall sick with multidrug-resistant (MDR) tuberculosis every year. Without robust pediatric data, clinical management follows international guidelines that are based on studies in adults and expert opinion. We aimed to identify baseline predictors of death, treatment failure, and loss to follow-up among children with MDR tuberculosis disease treated with regimens tailored to their drug susceptibility test (DST) result or to the DST result of a source case.
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