Usefulness and effectiveness of community pharmacists-led mobile phone communication in identification and referral of presumptive tuberculosis cases in a selected district of Tamil Nadu.

Background: Community pharmacists' usually are not able to be actively involved in the identification and referral of presumptive TB cases approaching their pharmacy for over-the-counter (OTC) drugs. The main barriers from their perspective were increased patient volume and work burden. Therefore, a new methodology was adopted by appointing an auxiliary pharmacist who will be actively involved in the identification and referral of presumptive TB cases. The present study aimed to assess the usefulness and effectiveness of community pharmacists-led mobile phone communication in identification and referral of presumptive tuberculosis cases in a selected district of Tamil Nadu.

Methods: A community intervention trial with pre and post-test comparison study was conducted among the community pharmacists in Tiruvallur district of Tamil Nadu. Knowledge about TB and referral practice of community pharmacists were captured and the same were taught to them. Details of the cases with the complaints of TB who came to the enrolled pharmacists for OTC drugs during the intervention period were collected by the community pharmacists and given to auxiliary pharmacist through WhatsApp. Auxiliary pharmacist called each patient and educated about TB and followed the patients.

Results: A total of 191 pharmacists were included in the study. 389 patients who approached pharmacy for OTC medications were suspected as TB by the community pharmacists based on their symptoms. 32 patients were not willing to give their details, while the details of others were collected by the community pharmacists and forwarded to auxiliary pharmacist through WhatsApp. 217 patients responded to phone calls made by the auxiliary pharmacist. Of them, 189 patients' health conditions were improved, while 28 patients suffered with symptoms and they had visited PHC and 2 patients were diagnosed as TB by clinician.

Conclusion: Use of auxiliary pharmacist in collaboration with community pharmacists through phone communication is a useful and comfortable mode of collection of presumptive TB cases from the community pharmacies. Similarly, health education and follow-up of the presumptive cases via phone call is an effective way in the identification and referral of presumptive tuberculosis cases.