TY - JOUR T1 - Increasing adherence to TB treatment – Pilot intervention in two counties in Romania JF - European Respiratory Journal JO - Eur Respir J VL - 38 IS - Suppl 55 SP - p2636 AU - Florentina Furtunescu AU - Victoria Mihaescu AU - Mihaela Stefan AU - Horia Cocei AU - Nicoleta Cioran AU - Elmira Ibraim Y1 - 2011/09/01 UR - http://erj.ersjournals.com/content/38/Suppl_55/p2636.abstract N2 - Introduction: TB is a major public health concern in Romania. All health services are provided free of charge to TB patients and them contacts, through the National TB Programme. However default rate in new pulmonary smear positive cases is over 5%.Aims and objectives: To measure the impact of a pilot intervention – giving small incentives – on the adherence to treatment of TB patients.Methods: A pilot intervention, by giving to compliant patients small incentives (around 12 EUR per patient and per month, consisting in tickets for common goods) was unfolded in two counties of Romania (Iasi and Prahova), in the first half of 2009. The incentives were awarded to patients with pulmonary TB and with all treatment doses taken in the previous month. The adherence to treatment was measured as the proportion of patients without default/lost from observation out of total number of registered patients. Transferred cases were excluded from analysis. The adherence rate was compared with that in the first half of the previous year (2008) in the same county.Results: During the study period 583 TB cases were registered in Iasi and 411 in Prahova and around 70% of them have received incentives. Percentage of TB patients taking all treatment doses until the final outcome was 93.1% in the first semester of 2009 versus 88.8% in the same period of 2008 in Prahova county. In Iasi county the percentages were 94.6% and 92.1% respectively.Conclusions: The project induced a significant increase in proportion of patients that finalize the treatment in Prahova county (p=0.010), but not in Iasi county (p=0.090). Giving small incentives seems to increase the adherence to the TB treatment during for months. ER -