Regular treatment termed key to end TB

PESHAWAR: Experts at a seminar on Saturday urged the people suffering from tuberculosis to continue regular treatment for a healthy life.

“Tuberculosis is a curable disease and proper treatment is required. The people having the symptom should consult the doctors as early as possible,” said an expert.

The seminar titled ‘United to End TB’ was organised at the Peshawar Press Club in connection with the World TB Day.

Pakistan Chest Society (PCS) president Dr Arshad Javed, general secretary Dr Sadia Ashraf, PCS provincial chapter’s general secretary Shahid Afridi, central secretary information secretary Dr Taj Mohammad and coordinator Khyber Pakhtunkhwa TB Control Programme Dost Mohammad spoke on the occasion.

They said that effective management of the patient was only possible when the infected person consulted a doctor for diagnosis and regular treatment for eight months without any break.

The experts said that TB patients who hesitated to consult doctors not only put their own lives at stake, but also caused danger to healthy people of the society.

They said that women were the major sufferers in this regard as they usually avoided getting their tests done due to some social problems.

Dr Arshad Javed urged the TB patients to shun carelessness during the course of treatment to save themselves from multiple drugs resistance (MDR).

He said that carelessness in taking medicine could convert a minor disease into MDR, which, he said, was very dangerous and expensive to treat.

He said that according to the World Health Organisation 96 million people suffered from the disease in 2014 worldwide.

Dr Taj said that about 50,000 patients were registered every year in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. He said that 231 diagnostic and 810 treatment centres were working under the supervision of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa TB Control Programme with the facility of treatment short course, diagnosis and providing medicines to the patients free of cost.

He said that the stigma attached with TB needed to be removed, adding that media could play an effective role to create awareness among the people, especially in the remote areas so that the people could contact the TB centres for diagnosis and treatment without any hesitation.