Prevalence of primary INH and Rifampicin resistance among treatment Naïve tuberculosis cases in tertiary care teaching hospital in Puducherry: A prospective cross-sectional study

India contributes to approximately one-third of total global tuberculosis (TB) and one-fourth of all Multi-Drug Resistant TB (MDR-TB) burden respectively. The First National drug resistance survey (2014-16) showed MDRTB rates of 6.19% overall and 2.14% in newly diagnosed TB cases. With the above problem of primary drug resistance among newly diagnosed tuberculosis cases, the present study was planned to find the prevalence of Isoniazid (INH) and Rifampicin resistance in the treatment naïve new tuberculosis cases.: Study design: Prospective, cross-sectional.: Treatment naive newly diagnosed pulmonary tuberculosis cases.: 125.: After informed written consent, Sputum samples were collected and subjected to culture in MGIT 960 and positive cultures were recorded and subjected to drug sensitivity testing for INH (0.1 μg/ml) and Rifampicin (1 μg/ml) and a parallel non-drug MGIT was run as a control.: Most cases were males and belonged to the 20-59 years age group. Isoniazid (INH) resistance was found in 7 out of 125 samples, none had resistance to rifampicin. None of the categorical variables or grading of smear were having any statistically significant correlation with INH resistance.: INH resistance was found to be low (5.6%) with negligible MDR in the current study. Regular and large studies are needed to quantify and tackle the problem of primary MDR TB.