Morbidity rate of drug-susceptible tuberculosis and its medico-economic impact

Abstract

This assessment aims to identify the increasing number of morbidity of drug susceptible tuberculosis (TB) and its treatment outcomes, government cost of medicines as well as the economic impact on society. A retrospective observational study had been conducted in a government hospital using a patient’s record from 2013 to 2017, treated under the Direct Observed Therapy Short Course (DOTS) program in Karachi, Pakistan. Altogether, 3872 drug-susceptible TB patients were included in the study. All data had been analyzed using SPSS version 16 software. It had been found from the data that each year number of new smear-positive TB patients remained same, that is, 85% in 2013, 90% in 2014, 89.5% in 2015, 91% in 2016 and 92.3% in 2017 while slight decrease in relapse cases, that is, 15, 10, 10.4, 9 and 7.6% in 2013 to 2017, respectively. The single factor analysis of variance (ANOVA) shows that there is no significant difference between the gender of TB patient throughout the duration with the p-value=0.3769. During the years of study, cost of medicine increased due to rapid rise of inflation in the region which inturn caused the significant financial constraint on patients and their families. moral and financial support are important to render an individual productive again in the society. Key words: Drug-susceptible tuberculosis (DS-TB), anti-tubercular therapy, cost of medicine.