| Abstract: | In order to ensure regularity of ambulatory
treatment of new cases ot' pulmonary tuberculosis,
a fully supervised intermittent chemotherapy regimen
was tried in 2 rttral counties of Beijing. The "bare
foot doctors" of the village health cooperatives were
designated to administer and supervise every treat
ment. The regimen was chosen taking into considera-
tion of the effectiveness, side-effects, acceptability,
cost and supply of drugs, and consisted of INH and
SM daily for one month, then every three days for
five months, and then every five days for 6 0r 12
months. For smear-negative cases, the daily phase
was omitted. The percentage of compliance among
229 cases in l year was 94.2'/o, including those who
missed one or two treatments only. The sputum
conversion rate among 103 sensitive cases was 98.1"/o
and that of resistant cases was 63%. Changes of
regimen due to side-effects was l.3%. The bacterio-
logic relapse rates during one-year follow-up were
2.1'/o among the initial sensitive cases and 4To among
the initial resistant cases. A reserved regimen con
sisting of rifampin (RFP) and ethambuto (EMB) was
applied to the sputum non-converted cases in the
programme of field work. This made an overall
sputum conversion rate up t0 98To. The average
overall cost of drugs for each case was about 49
yuan (RMB) (roughly 25 US dollars). |
