Tuberculosis treatment outcomes using treatment supporters in Ketu South Municipality of Volta Region in Ghana

Introduction : the current global tuberculosis (TB) epidemic places a lot of pressure on health care managers, especially those in the developing countries to seek innovative ways of delivering effective treatment to TB patients. One of the strategies employed was a directly observed therapy for all patients, where community members are used to supervise TB patients during the treatment regimen. Even though treatment supporters are used to improve the situation, proportion cured and completing treatment are still low. This study was conducted in Ketu South municipality of the Volta region in Ghana on tuberculosis treatment outcomes using treatment supporters to determine treatment supporter factors influencing treatment outcomes in the municipality. Methods : the study was a cross sectional study, using quantitative methods to collect data on 137 TB clients and their treatment supporters. Tuberculosis records were reviewed to determine the proportion of TB clients cured, those who completed treatment and those who defaulted. Questionnaire was then used to collect data from their treatment supporters. The data was analyzed using SPSS and Stata. Univariate, chi-squared and logistic regression analyses were done to determine proportions, differences and strengths of associations between the independent variables and the dependent variables. Results : tuberculosis case detection for the municipality was 96.1% with a treatment success of 79.6%. Treatment outcome for cure, completion and treatment default were 66.7%, 81.9% and 20.4% respectively. It was realized that some treatment supporter factors influenced treatment cure of the TB clients. These factors include: age of treatment supporter being older or younger than the TB client, marital status of the supporter, selection of the treatment supporter and treatment supporter’s knowledge on TB. Conclusion : tuberculosis clients are more likely to be cured when they are supervised by older people, married and have good knowledge of TB and are selected by the TB patient. Financial challenge and time spent on supervising drug intake are the main challenges faced by the treatment supporters in Ketu South municipality.