title: Leprosy treatment dropout: a systematic review.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Leprosy is a chronic infectious disease endemic in some undeveloped areas, and still represents a public health problem in Brazil. Therefore, the control of this endemic disease depends necessarily on the institution of correct treatment and containment of treatment dropout. This study aims to conduct a systematic review of published studies on treatment dropout of leprosy.
  
  
  METHODS
  We conducted a systematic review of articles on treatment dropout of leprosy, published between january 2005 and april 2013, on MEDLINE and SciELO databases. The search was performed using the MeSH terms: "leprosy"; "patients dropouts" and the keywords: "leprosy, treatment" and "noncompliance, leprosy" in association, beside the equivalents in Portuguese.
  
  
  RESULTS
  There were originally 196 references. After analyzing the titles and abstracts of articles, 20 articles were obtained and included in the final sample.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Leprosy is a notifiable disease known as its disfiguring capability and the high rate of non-compliance to treatment. The low adhesion is responsible for the remaining potential sources of infection, irreversible complications, incomplete cure and, additionally, may lead to resistance to multiple drugs. Many factors are responsible for the interruption or dropout treatment: socioeconomic factors, education level, knowledge about the disease, lack of efficiency of health services, demographics, side effects of drugs, alcoholism, among others.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The recent scientific literature about the subject diverge regarding the factors that most affect the dropout problem in treating leprosy patients. However, better integration between professionals and users, and greater commitment of the patient, are common points among the authors of the studies.
authors.affiliation: Faculdade de Medicina do ABC, Santo André, SP, Brazil. regiogirao@hotmail.com.
authors.forename: Régio José Santiago
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Girão
authors.forename: Nara Lívia Rezende
authors.initials: NL
authors.lastname: Soares
authors.forename: Juliana Viana
authors.initials: JV
authors.lastname: Pinheiro
authors.forename: Giuliano da Paz
authors.initials: Gda P
authors.lastname: Oliveira
authors.forename: Sionara Melo Figueiredo
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: de Carvalho
authors.forename: Luiz Carlos
authors.initials: LC
authors.lastname: de Abreu
authors.forename: Vitor E
authors.initials: VE
authors.lastname: Valenti
authors.forename: Fernando Luiz Affonso
authors.initials: FL
authors.lastname: Fonseca