Interventions in Place to Enhance Tuberculosis Case Detection in Health Facilities in Greater Accra Region, Ghana.

Abstract

Introduction Despite the global response to the tuberculosis epidemic, a high burden of this disease still persists particularly affecting the poor and vulnerable population. Many cases are missed annually and passive case detection have not proven to improve on the number of tuberculosis cases detected. Implementation of facility and community based active case detection interventions have been documented to increase TB case detection rates. The aim of this study was to assess the interventions in place to enhance tuberculosis case detection in public health facilities in the Greater Accra region, Ghana Methods A cross-sectional study was conducted among TB coordinators of public health facilities in the Greater Accra region of Ghana. Questionnaires were administered to each TB coordinator to evaluate the TB case detection intervention measures being implemented and any hindering or facilitating factors to the implementation of the interventions. Results Only 1 out of 71 health facilities was implementing all the 6 intervention measures and 4 health facilities were not implementing any of the tuberculosis case intervention measures. Twenty-seven out of 71 health facilities were implementing at least 3 intervention measures. Most respondents (72.41%) stated periodic training on tuberculosis case detection interventions as an important facilitating factor and 75.38% of them also indicated that little or no support from the Ministry of Health or the National Tuberculosis control Programme was a major hindering factor. Conclusions Public health facilities in general are not implementing all the tuberculosis case detection interventions. However some facilities are implementing some of the tuberculosis case detection interventions. There was lack of monitoring and evaluation of tuberculosis case detection implementation activities at the health facilities. Effective supervision, monitoring and evaluation and provision of required resources for intervention activities of the health facilities will ensure implementation of all case detection interventions. Keywords Tuberculosis, case detection, implementation, health facilities, Greater Accra, monitoring, evaluation