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CDC and Harvard School of Public Health infection control
experts shared a World Health Organization (WHO)-approved TB prevention model
with workshop attendees at Sion Hospital in Mumbai, India. The experts also
analyzed the impact of Sion Hospital’s ventilation system design on TB
transmission within the hospital.
Dr. Sujata Baweja, head of Sion Hospital’s microbiology
department, stated that the WHO TB prevention model designated “cough officers”
to “fast-track” patients who entered the hospital with a cough. The cough
officers asked the patient how long the cough had lasted, and then requested
that the patient take a TB sputum test (away from other patients) that would
give immediate results. Patients with positive sputum test results moved
immediately to a separate area where they would not interact with other
patients and spread TB.
Cambodia, which recorded 1,500 TB cases per 100,000 people
in 2002, reduced the number of new TB infections dramatically using this
screening method. The number of new TB cases dropped by 45 percent in 2012
after Cambodian hospitals implemented the model.
The US experts presented the infection control workshop to
address recent increases in TB incidence and mortality among nurses,
physicians, and class IV hospital workers in Mumbai hospitals. A 24-year-old
Sion Hospital medical intern and a 21-year-old Nair Hospital nursing student
recently died from TB. Thirteen Sion staff members and nine Nair Hospital staff
members also were receiving TB treatment. State-run JJ Hospital had eight staff
members in TB treatment.
