Tuberculosis control in a highly endemic indigenous community in Brazil.

In Latin America, indigenous populations have high rates of non-completion of TB treatment and case fatality and have been defined as a priority group for investments. To evaluate TB control, a retrospective cohort study was performed to identify factors predictive of non-completion of treatment and mortality in an indigenous and non-indigenous population between 2002 and 2008 in Dourados, Brazil. A 90% reduction in non-completion of TB treatment was observed in the indigenous population after DOTS (directly observed treatment, short course) implementation (20% vs 2%).