PLoS ONE (Jan 2023)

Recurrence of pulmonary tuberculosis in India: Findings from the 2019-2021 nationwide community-based TB prevalence survey.

  • Prathiksha Giridharan,
  • Sriram Selvaraju,
  • Raghuram Rao,
  • Kiran Rade,
  • Kannan Thiruvengadam,
  • Smita Asthana,
  • Rakesh Balachandar,
  • Sampada Dipak Bangar,
  • Avi Kumar Bansal,
  • Jyothi Bhat,
  • Debjit Chakraborty,
  • Vishal Chopra,
  • Dasarathi Das,
  • Shanta Dutta,
  • Kangjam Rekha Devi,
  • Sunil Kumar,
  • Avula Laxmaiah,
  • Major Madhukar,
  • Amarendra Mahapatra,
  • Suman Sundar Mohanty,
  • Chethana Rangaraju,
  • Jyotirmayee Turuk,
  • Kamran Zaman,
  • Rajendran Krishnan,
  • Sivakumar Shanmugam,
  • Nishant Kumar,
  • Rajendra Panduranga Joshi,
  • Somashekar Narasimhaiah,
  • Padmapriyadarsini Chandrasekaran,
  • Raman R Gangakhedkar,
  • Balram Bhargava

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0294254
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 18, no. 12
p. e0294254

Abstract

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Recurrent Tuberculosis patients contribute to a significant proportion of TB burden in India. A nationwide survey was conducted during 2019-2021 across India among adults to estimate the prevalence of TB. A total of 322480 individuals were screened and 1402 were having TB. Of this, 381 (27.1%) had recurrent TB. The crude prevalence (95% CI) of recurrent TB was 118 (107-131) per 100,000 population. The median duration between episodes of TB was 24 months. The proportion of drug resistant TB was 11.3% and 3.6% in the recurrent group and new TB patients respectively. Higher prevalence of recurrent TB was observed in elderly, males, malnourished, known diabetics, smokers, and alcohol users. (p<0.001). To prevent TB recurrence, all treated tuberculosis patients must be followed at least for 24 months, with screening for Chest X-ray, liquid culture every 6 months, smoking cessation, alcohol cessation, nutritional interventions and good diabetic management.