Abstract
BackgroundTuberculosis is an important health concern in Iraq, but limited research has examined the quality of tuberculosis care and the survival of the patients. This study aimed to assess the 12-month survival of tuberculosis patients and evaluate the effect of the associated risk factors on patients’ survival.MethodsWe reviewed the records of 728 patients with tuberculosis who were registered and treated at the Chest and Respiratory Disease Center in Erbil, Iraqi Kurdistan Region, from January 2012 to December 2017. Demographic data, the site of the disease, and treatment outcomes were retrieved from patients’ records. Data analysis included the use of the Kaplan–Meier method and the log-rank test to calculate the estimates of the survival and assess the differences in the survival among the patients. The Cox regression model was used for univariate and multivariate analysis.ResultsThe mean period of the follow-up of the patients was 7.6 months. Of 728 patients with tuberculosis, 50 (6.9%) had died. The 12-month survival rate of our study was 93.1%. A statistically significant difference was detected in the survival curves of different age groups (P < 0.001) and the site of the disease (P = 0.012). In multivariate analysis, lower survival rates were only observed among patients aged ≥65 years (hazard ratio = 9.36, 95% CI 2.14–40.95) and patients with extrapulmonary disease (hazard ratio = 2.61, 95% CI 1.30–5.27).ConclusionThe 12-month survival rate of tuberculosis patients managed at the Chest and Respiratory Disease Center in Erbil was similar to the international rates. The high rates of extrapulmonary tuberculosis and the low survival rate necessitate further studies and action with a possible revision to the tuberculosis management strategy.
Highlights
Tuberculosis is an important health concern in Iraq, but limited research has examined the quality of tuberculosis care and the survival of the patients
Lower survival rates were only observed among patients aged ≥65 years and patients with the extrapulmonary disease (Table 2)
In this study, we aimed to assess the survival rate of 728 TB patients registered at the Chest and Respiratory Disease Center in Erbil, Iraq during the period from 2012 to 2017 and assess the effect of associated factors such as the age, gender, site of infection and residence zone on the survival rate
Summary
Tuberculosis is an important health concern in Iraq, but limited research has examined the quality of tuberculosis care and the survival of the patients. This study aimed to assess the 12-month survival of tuberculosis patients and evaluate the effect of the associated risk factors on patients’ survival. Tuberculosis (TB) is a major global health problem and an important cause of morbidity and mortality in the world. TB is the ninth leading cause of death in the world despite the presence of several treatment strategies to manage the disease [1]. TB causes a wide range of clinical infections. The central biology of the causative bacterium of the disease, Mycobacterium tuberculosis, makes it able to persist in the form of latent TB resulting in long-term asymptomatic infection [4]
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