Study of addiction in newly diagnosed patients with pulmonary tuberculosis in Abbasia Chest Hospital

Abstract

Background Drug abuse is an important factor in the epidemiology of tuberculosis (TB) in developing and developed countries, and there is a triple relationship between pulmonary TB, HIV, and drug users. Aim The aim of this work was to study the relation between addiction and newly diagnosed patients with pulmonary TB from Abbasia Chest Hospital’s outpatient clinic or admitted to the departments or ICU during the 8 months from August 2015 to April 2016. Patients and methods This prospective study was conducted on 100 addict male patients who were diagnosed as having new cases of pulmonary TB (positive sputum for ZN stain) at Chest Departments and respiratory ICU in Abbasia Chest Hospital during the 8 months from August 2015 to April 2016 to detect the relation between addiction and TB by full history, laboratory investigations, and chest radiography. Results Most of the cases were taking a combination of drugs and more of cannabis, except for dead cases, where intravenous heroin was the top drug abused with longer duration of addiction. Cavitary and infiltrative patterns were present in more than half of the cases, with being more infiltrative among dead cases, with grade III severity in the chest radiography taking the upper hand. A minority of the cases had pleural effusion, pneumothorax and lung abscess. Conclusion Drug abusers are at high risk of TB infection and disease, and intravenous drug abuse is considered an important factor in HIV-associated TB. Recommendations Drug addiction is a major public health problem that needs to be studied from different aspects.