Tuberculosis: active case finding survey in an urban area of India, in 2012

Tuberculosis (TB) continues to pose a major global health problem and thus intensive action is needed to control and ultimately eliminate the disease.

An active case finding (ACF) survey was conducted in the urban slum areas of the R-South Municipal Ward of Mumbai City for a period of two months from June to July 2012. Micro planning for survey was done by District Tuberculosis Officer and Medical Officer of Health of R-South ward. The entire health post staffs of R-South ward were trained to perform the survey. TB suspects were identified by trained community health volunteers during their home to home visit. These suspects were referred to the designated microscopy centers (DMCs) for sputum examination and those diagnosed with TB were put on anti-TB treatment.

A total of 278 TB suspects were identified on enquiring on the presence of symptoms suggestive of TB. Out of them 221(79.5%) patients got tested for sputum examination. Sputum positive TB was diagnosed in 29 suspects and the sputum positivity rate was 13.1%, which was slightly higher than the passive case finding norms of 10% as prescribed under Revised National TB Control Program.

Active case finding for tuberculosis in the general community was discouraged for several decades because of high costs of implementation. However, results of the survey suggest that periodic ACF should be incorporated in populations wherever tuberculosis incidence / prevalence is high as there was a definite improvement in the case detection rate.