A dynamic hybrid model for efficient tuberculosis incidence rate prediction

Tuberculosis remains a global health challenge, predicting its incidences is crucial for effective planning and intervention strategies. This study combines AutoRegressive Integrated Moving Average (ARIMA) and Nonlinear AutoRegressive with exogenous input (NARX) models as an innovative approach for TB incidence rate prediction. The performance of the proposed model (ARIMA-NARX) was evaluated using standard metrics (MSE, RMSE, MAE, and MAPE), and it was refined to achieve the best average predictive accuracies with an MSE: 0.0622, RMSE: 0.0851, MAE: 0.07520, and MAPE: 0.05535 followed by NARX 0.1597, 0.3189, 0.2724, and 0.3366, and ARIMA (2,0,0) 0.7781, 0.5959, 0.6524, and 0.6080 Models. These findings are expected to shed light on the TB incidence rate, providing valuable information to policymakers such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and health professionals. The developed model can potentially serve as a predictive tool for proactive TB control and intervention strategies in the region and the world at large.