A survey of tuberculosis hospitals in India.
METHODS
Hospitals with beds for tuberculosis (TB) in India.


OBJECTIVE
To assess diagnostic and treatment practices at institutions offering secondary or tertiary level care for TB patients, and to determine the resources being used at these institutions.


METHODS
Countrywide cross-sectional survey of TB hospitals using a mailed semi-structured questionnaire sent to all 105 hospitals with 100 or more beds and to all State Directorate Health Services.


RESULTS
The 94 hospitals that returned the questionnaire had 15773 TB beds, one third of the total TB beds in the country. Nearly 1 million patients sought treatment in the TB hospitals and one third were diagnosed with TB; the ratio of smear-positive to smear-negative patients was 1:2.7. Sixty-four per cent of hospitals prescribed unobserved rifampicin in the continuation phase, and 56% of sputum smear-positive patients were hospitalised. The annual expenditure for the TB hospitals was more than the total annual budget for the TB control programme of the country.


CONCLUSIONS
In view of the high number of patients seen and the suboptimal practices observed, urgent steps should be taken to ensure implementation of correct diagnostic and treatment policies in hospitals with TB beds.
Singh
A A
AA
Stop TB Department, World Health Organization, 5th floor, A Wing, Nirman Bhavan, New Delhi, India. singh_a@vsnl.com
Frieden
T R
TR
Khatri
G R
GR
Garg
R
R
D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D006782:Hospitals, Special / Q000191:economics / Q000592:standards / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D007194:India; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014376:Tuberculosis / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000628:therapy*