- Helping the patient to understand his/her disease and treatment
- Enabling the patient to acquire and maintain skills that allow him/her to optimally manage his/her disease in daily life
- Answering the patient’s questions throughout the treatment
10.3 Patient care and support
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Patient compliance is a key factor to treatment success. Health education and counselling on the disease and treatment adherence should be provided to all TB patients as well as family members. Some patients may stop the treatment midway for various reasons. Hence, strict adherence to treatment should be ensured to stop the transmission of TB, cure the patients and prevent the emergence of drug-resistance. Patient support is the shared responsibility of the entire health care team (clinicians, nurses, treatment supporters, social workers, etc.) and is a continuous process till the end of treatment.
Listen to the patient, provide encouragement, and gain his/her trust, so that s/he does not hesitate to share all treatment related issues or disclose possible lapses in treatment. These things happen fairly often, and it is important to know about them in order to help find solutions.
Implement social support measures for patients with limited resources. Depending on the specific needs of patients:
- Social workers can help to obtain disability allowances, housing assistance, shelter for the homeless, etc.
• Health education and counselling on the disease and treatment adherence should be provided to patients on TB treatment (Strong recommendation, moderate certainty in the evidence)
• A package of treatment adherence interventions may be offered to patients on TB treatment in conjunction with the selection of a suitable treatment administration option (Conditional recommendation, low certainty in the evidence)
• Psychological support to patient