Implementation of a patient-centered model of providing anti-tuberculosis care in the Chui region

The goal is to discuss measures to improve anti-tuberculosis care for the population and interaction in this direction between health organizations of the Chui region, local authorities, and public organizations.

As Svetlana Volkova, Deputy Plenipotentiary Representative of the President of the Kyrgyz Republic in Chui region, noted, “tuberculosis requires constant and close attention, forces and resources in order to reduce its destructive impact on human health and minimize its negative social and economic consequences. Moreover, attention is required not only from medical workers, but also from many state bodies and the whole society as a whole, because tuberculosis is a disease, without appropriate control over which the risk of transmission of infection can increase. "

During the round table, the following issues were discussed:

• the situation with tuberculosis in the world, Kyrgyzstan and Chui region;
• reforms carried out in the system of providing anti-tuberculosis care to the population of the Chui region;
• barriers to TB care;
• the importance of close interaction between medical workers and local authorities, public organizations, to improve social support for people with tuberculosis;
• expansion of measures taken by public organizations to improve access to anti-tuberculosis services.

According to the Chui region Health Coordinator Baktygul Mamytova, “since an intersectoral approach is important in the treatment of tuberculosis, it is good that these issues were raised in the presence of not only doctors, but also representatives of all local government agencies, whose consolidated actions will help keep the tuberculosis situation in Chui oblast under control”.

The roundtable participants expressed concern that the COVID-19 pandemic could have a negative impact on the situation with tuberculosis in the country and the region. “Not only Kyrgyzstan, but the whole world expects an increase in the number of patients with tuberculosis due to the fact that the widespread involvement of sanitary-epidemiological service institutions and primary-level medical organizations in the fight against a new infection distracted their attention from tuberculosis, including its active detection, - said the director of the National Center for Phthisiology Madamin Karataev. "This concern in the global medical community is reflected in the recent World Health Organization's Global Report on Tuberculosis, which highlights the first increase in TB deaths since 2005."

The outcome of the round table was the adoption of a resolution with a plan of concrete measures to increase the involvement of local authorities in the fight against tuberculosis, improve psychosocial support for people affected by tuberculosis. The USAID "Cure Tuberculosis" project received special gratitude from the Plenipotentiary Representative of the President of the Kyrgyz Republic for its comprehensive and all-round support for reforms in the anti-tuberculosis service in Kyrgyzstan and the Chui region as well. A willingness was expressed to continue to support cooperation with USAID, taking into account the need to achieve full sustainability of the ongoing reforms.