Contact tracing strategies in household and congregate environments to identify cases of tuberculosis in low- and moderate-incidence populations

Menezes, Darryl Braganza; Menezes, Bunota; Dedicoat, Martin

doi:10.1002/14651858.cd013077.pub2

Cited by 4 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…Fox et al [ 86 ] aimed to compare the diagnostic yield of TB disease between active case finding and passive case finding in TB contacts but did not identify any trials for inclusion in the review. Braganza Menezes et al [ 87 ] also could not identify trials for inclusion in a review aiming to assess the effectiveness of novel methods, for example, social network analysis, of contact tracing versus the current standard of care to identify individuals with TB infection or TB disease. A review by Kranzer et al [ 88 ] included observational studies and concluded that screening compared with standard care increases the number of patients with TB disease found in the short term, but that it is unknown whether it impacts TB epidemiology.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis Case-Finding Strategies: Scoping Review

van Wyk,

Nliwasa,

et al. 2024

JMIR Public Health Surveill

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Background Finding individuals with drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB) is important to control the pandemic and improve patient clinical outcomes. To our knowledge, systematic reviews assessing the effectiveness, cost-effectiveness, acceptability, and feasibility of different DR-TB case-finding strategies to inform research, policy, and practice, have not been conducted and the scope of primary research is unknown. Objective We therefore assessed the available literature on DR-TB case-finding strategies. Methods We looked at systematic reviews, trials, qualitative studies, diagnostic test accuracy studies, and other primary research that sought to improve DR-TB case detection specifically. We excluded studies that included patients seeking care for tuberculosis (TB) symptoms, patients already diagnosed with TB, or were laboratory-based. We searched the academic databases of MEDLINE, Embase, The Cochrane Library, Africa-Wide Information, CINAHL (Cumulated Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature), Epistemonikos, and PROSPERO (The International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews) using no language or date restrictions. We screened titles, abstracts, and full-text articles in duplicate. Data extraction and analyses were carried out in Excel (Microsoft Corp). Results We screened 3646 titles and abstracts and 236 full-text articles. We identified 6 systematic reviews and 61 primary studies. Five reviews described the yield of contact investigation and focused on household contacts, airline contacts, comparison between drug-susceptible tuberculosis and DR-TB contacts, and concordance of DR-TB profiles between index cases and contacts. One review compared universal versus selective drug resistance testing. Primary studies described (1) 34 contact investigations, (2) 17 outbreak investigations, (3) 3 airline contact investigations, (4) 5 epidemiological analyses, (5) 1 public-private partnership program, and (6) an e-registry program. Primary studies were all descriptive and included cross-sectional and retrospective reviews of program data. No trials were identified. Data extraction from contact investigations was difficult due to incomplete reporting of relevant information. Conclusions Existing descriptive reviews can be updated, but there is a dearth of knowledge on the effectiveness, cost-effectiveness, acceptability, and feasibility of DR-TB case-finding strategies to inform policy and practice. There is also a need for standardization of terminology, design, and reporting of DR-TB case-finding studies.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis Case-Finding Strategies: Scoping Review

van Wyk,

Nliwasa,

et al. 2024

JMIR Public Health Surveill

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“…Randomized cluster-controlled clinical trials conceivably could test the efficacy of contact tracing. A Cochrane Review has pointed out the lack of contact tracing randomised trials for tuberculosis [17]. This gap in medical evidence applies to most infectious diseases.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Isolation of infected people and their contacts is likely to be effective against many short-term epidemics

Geffen

Low

2020

Preprint

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Background: Isolation of infected people and their contacts may be an effective way to control outbreaks of infectious disease, such as influenza and SARS-CoV-2. Models can provide insights into the efficacy of contact tracing, coupled with isolating or quarantining at risk people. Methods: We developed an agent-based model and simulated 15, 000 short term illnesses, with varying characteristics. For each illness we ran ten simulations on the following scenarios: (1) No tracing or isolation (None), (2) isolation of agents who have tested positive (Isolation), (3) scenario 2 coupled with minimal contact tracing and quarantine of contacts (Minimum), (4) scenario 3 with more effective contact tracing (Moderate), and (5) perfect isolation of agents who test positive and perfect tracing and quarantine of all their contacts (Maximum). Results: The median total infections of the Isolation, Minimum, Moderate and Maximum scenarios were 80%, 40%, 17% and 4% of the no intervention scenario respectively. Conclusions: Isolation of infected patients and quarantine of their contacts, even if moderately well implemented, is likely to substantially reduce the number of infections in an outbreak. Randomized controlled trials to confirm these results in the real world and to analyse the cost effectiveness of contact tracing and isolation during coronavirus and influenza outbreaks are warranted.

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