TB treatment success rate up: WHO

By ENNIO KUBLE
THE tuberculosis (TB) treatment success rate has inched up from a five-year average of around 60% to 74% in Port Moresby.
While in Lae, the success rate increased from 64% to 90% most recently, the World Health Organisation (WHO) pointed out.
Information forwarded by WHO said among the 87 districts of the country, very few districts had reached those levels of treatment success rates.
The success story has been attributed to the volunteers who were involved in the National TB programme who directly observed treatment process from patients.
The treatment programme comes under the directly observed therapy short-course (DOTS) strategy.
A survey done by the WHO found that 60% of the tuberculosis patients in Lae received treatment from the community-based DOTS approach in 2006.
The rest of the patients received directly observed treatment in their nearest urban clinics. In Port Moresby, the community approach had just begun and hence only 10% of the patients received treatment in this manner in 2006.
The survey also found that about 90% of the patients who received treatment in this manner succeeded in completing their treatment, compared to merely 60% among those who collected the medications for self-administration at home.
Much of that success depends on keeping patients on treatment for six months.
WHO said patients the world over stopped their medication too early once they start feeling better, which usually tooks no more than a couple of months.
The danger with interruption of treatment was that the disease lingers in the body and could become drug-resistant, which is very expensive and difficult to treat, the WHO warned.