The Impact of Public Partnership to Identify Patients with Tuberculosis in Darashar, Iran

Participation of community-based services in the National Tuberculosis Control Programme is (NTCP) necessary to identify and treat all patients with tuberculosis (TB). We developed a novel model to encourage family members and relative to participate in the RNTCP in Darahshar city.

This community-based intervention was included of two groups of community (relatives of patients and schools). They were trained to identify and refer of patients to allocated health centers. Case finding indices were compared initially and one year intervention. The exponential distribution and logarithmic of incidence were used to compare the incidence of tuberculosis after the intervention with other cities of the province.

The incidence of smear positive cases increased from 5.1/100,000 to 35.2/100,000 (p <001). There was a statistically significant difference between incidence of smear positive cases in Darehshar city and other cities in Ilam province (p <001). During the intervention, 408 suspected patients was identified, it showed about 297 percent increased in case finding (cases in the previous year of the intervention were 137 cases) (p <001).

It seems that community-based intervention could be an effective method to enhance of identify and control of patients with tuberculosis.