10 Jun 2018

 Failure to adhere to TB treatment could make the bacteria causing the disease resistant to drugs finally triggering off multi-drug-resistance TB, Kanye District Health Management Team senior medical officer, Dr Dick Mpitika has warned.

Speaking in an interview, he said six cases of multi-drug-resistance TB were registered in Kanye last year. “In 2017, we recorded a total number of 203 on TB treatment within the district while this year from January to March we recorded 72 patients,” said Dr Mpitika adding that Kgwatlheng ward was the most affected catchment area in Kanye.

Encouraging patients to comply and adhere to their treatment, Dr Mpitika also warned it was possible for a child to be born with TB if the pregnant mother did not take medication accordingly.

He stated that with appropriate management, TB was a curable disease. He described TB as an airborne communicable disease transmitted from human to human through coughing or sneezing.
“Pulmonary TB is the common form of active TB. Its milliary form, which is lung disease, may disseminate the bacteria to invade other organs and cause extra-pulmonary TB,” he said.

He said forms of extra pulmonary TB included Cutaneous (skin), spinal, bone and joint, central nervous system (Meningitis), renal, lymph nodes (Adenitis), pericardial, liver and pancreas among others. The symptoms of active pulmonary TB, Dr Mpitika said, were a productive cough, sometimes bloodstained, weight loss, chest pains, fever, night sweats and weakness.

However, he said symptoms differed according to the affected organs. Dr Mpitika said people with strong immunity could be affected by TB bacteria yet remain healthy and not transmit the disease.

Only people with compromised immune systems such as persons living with HIV, those with malnutrition, diabetic patients or tobacco smokers had a high risk of getting TB, he said.

He said apart from HIV, poor living conditions such as residing in an over-crowded environment, lifestyle, education level and constant mobility of patients were contributory factors to the high burden of TB in the region. Ends