CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 1,080Tuberculosis Research and EpidemiologyMedication Adherence and ComplianceHIV/AIDS Research and Interventions

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 77 of the 77 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.

Patient Adherence to Tuberculosis Treatment: A Systematic Review of Qualitative Research

Open access
Munro, Salla A, Lewin, Simon A, Smith, Helen J, Engel, Mark E, Fretheim, Atle, Volmink, Jimmy·2007·PLoS Medicine
DOI 10.1371/journal.pmed.0040238PMC PMC1925126
Open this paper in CoChat — free accountOpen PDF

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Tuberculosis (TB) is a major contributor to the global burden of disease and has received considerable attention in recent years, particularly in low- and middle-income countries where it is closely associated with HIV/AIDS. Poor adherence to treatment is common despite various interventions aimed at improving treatment completion. Lack of a comprehensive and holistic understanding of barriers to and facilitators of, treatment adherence is currently a major obstacle to finding effective solutions. The aim of this systematic review of qualitative studies was to understand the factors considered important by patients, caregivers and health care providers in contributing to TB medication adherence. METHODS AND FINDINGS: We searched 19 electronic databases (1966-February 2005) for qualitative studies on patients', caregivers', or health care providers' perceptions of adherence to preventive or curative TB treatment with the free text terms "Tuberculosis AND (adherence OR compliance OR concordance)". We supplemented our search with citation searches and by consulting experts. For included studies, study quality was assessed using a predetermined checklist and data were extracted independently onto a standard form. We then followed Noblit and Hare's method of meta-ethnography to synthesize the findings, using both reciprocal translation and line-of-argument synthesis. We screened 7,814 citations and selected 44 articles that met the prespecified inclusion criteria. The synthesis offers an overview of qualitative evidence derived from these multiple international studies. We identified eight major themes across the studies: organisation of treatment and care; interpretations of illness and wellness; the financial burden of treatment; knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs about treatment; law and immigration; personal characteristics and adherence behaviour; side effects; and family, community, and household support. Our interpretation of the themes across all studies produced a line-of-argument synthesis describing how four major factors interact to affect adherence to TB treatment: structural factors, including poverty and gender discrimination; the social context; health service factors; and personal factors. The findings of this study are limited by the quality and foci of the included studies. CONCLUSIONS: Adherence to the long course of TB treatment is a complex, dynamic phenomenon with a wide range of factors impacting on treatment-taking behaviour. Patients' adherence to their medication regimens was influenced by the interaction of a number of these factors. The findings of our review could help inform the development of patient-centred interventions and of interventions to address structural barriers to treatment adherence.

Overview

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1371/journal.pmed.0040238

Cites

77 of 77 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Verification

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Citations

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Show all 76 references

Research works printed but not linked: 72

  1. Dye, 2006, Lancet, 367, 938
  2. Corbett, 2006, Lancet, 367, 926
  3. Cuneo, 1989, Clin Chest Med, 10, 375
  4. Volmink, 2006, Cochrane Database Syst Rev, 2
  5. Diwan, 1999, Lancet, 353, 1000
  6. Farmer, 1997, Soc Sci Med, 44, 347
  7. Dixon-Woods, 2004, Qual Saf Health Care, 13, 223
  8. Britten, 2002, J Health Serv Res Policy, 7, 209
  9. Barroso, 2003, West J Nurs Res, 25, 153
  10. Mays, 2000, Brit Med J, 320, 50
  11. Malterud, 2001, Lancet, 358, 483
  12. Rowan, 1997, Can Med Ass J, 157, 1442
  13. Campbell, 2003, Soc Sci Med, 56, 671
  14. Smith, 2005, Lancet, 366, 825
  15. Dixon-Woods, 2007, J Health Serv Res Pol, 12, 42
  16. Khan, 2005, Health Policy Plan, 20, 354
  17. Khan, 2000, Soc Sci Med, 50, 247
  18. Jaiswal, 2003, Trop Med Int Health, 8, 625
  19. Singh, 2002, Trop Med Int Health, 7, 693
  20. Johansson, 1999, Int J Tuberc Lung Dis, 3, 862
  21. Harper, 2003, Trans R Soc Trop Med Hyg, 97, 506
  22. Johansson, 1996, Tuber Lung Dis, 77, 178
  23. Gleissberg, 2001, Patient views on tuberculosis: Is compliance with treatment the key to success or beside the point?
  24. Sanou, 2004, Int J Tuberc Lung Dis, 8, 1479
  25. Greene, 2004, Cult Med Psychiatry, 28, 401
  26. Watkins, 2004, Qual Health Res, 14, 691
  27. Edginton, 2002, Int J Tuberc Lung Dis, 6, 1075
  28. Joseph, 2004, Am J Infect Control, 32, 456
  29. Nair, 1997, Health Policy Plan, 12, 77
  30. Coleman, 1998, Trop Doc, 28, 78
  31. Matebesi, 2004, Living with TB: The career of the tuberculosis patient in the free state, SA
  32. Menegoni, 1996, Med Anthropol Q, 10, 381
  33. Dick, 1996, Tuber Lung Dis, 77, 173
  34. Ellis, 1997, S Afr Med J, 87, 1047
  35. Johansson, 2002, Qual Health Res, 12, 473
  36. Asamoa, 1998, Social counselling and tuberculosis treatment adherence at Bethania hospital, Sialkot, Pakistan
  37. San Sebastian, 2000, Respir Med, 94, 648
  38. Watkins, 2004, Int J Tuberc Lung Dis, 8, 218
  39. Pushpananthan, 2000, Trop Doc, 30, 216
  40. Estcott, 2005, Soc Sci Med, 61, 1701
  41. Klink, 1969, Problems of regimen compliance in tuberculosis treatment
  42. Smith, 1995, J Public Health Manag Prac, 1, 14
  43. Rowe, 2005, Int J Tuberc Lung Dis, 9, 263
  44. Mata, 1985, Med Anthropol, 9, 57
  45. Ito, 1999, Med Anthropol Q, 13, 338
  46. Fong, 2004, Gender and access to DOTS program (Directly Observed Treatment, Short Course) in a poor rural and minority area of Gansu province, China
  47. Liefooghe, 1995, Soc Sci Med, 41, 1685
  48. Demissie, 2003, Soc Sci Med, 56, 2009
  49. Wares, 2003, Int J Tuberc Lung Dis, 7, 327
  50. Marra, 2004, Health Qual Life Outcomes, 2, 58
  51. Wyss, 2004, Beliefs about medication compliance in a migrant population diagnosed with TB
  52. Coreil, 2004, J Immigr Health, 6, 63
  53. Curtis, 1994, Public Health Rep, 109, 319
  54. Dick, 1997, S Afr Med J, 87, 1042
  55. Ngamvithayapong, 2000, AIDS, 14, 1413
  56. Ngamvithayapong, 1997, AIDS, 11, 107
  57. Sumartojo, 2000, AIDS, 14, S3
  58. Sumartojo, 1993, Am Rev Respir Dis, 147, 1311
  59. Lienhardt, 2003, The return of the White Plague: Global Poverty and the “new” tuberculosis, 195
  60. Tulsky, 2004, Int J Tuberc Lung Dis, 8, 83
  61. Horne, 2002, Psychol Health, 17, 17
  62. Horne, 1999, J Psychosom Res, 47, 555
  63. Ross, 2004, J Hum Hypertens, 18, 607
  64. Wichowski, 1997, J Adv Nurs, 25, 548
  65. Pound, 2005, Soc Sci Med, 61, 133
  66. Garner, 2007, Bull World Health Organ, 85, 404
  67. Berg, 2004, Patient Educ Couns, 52, 31
  68. Chang, 2004, Int J Tuberc Lung Dis, 8, 1492
  69. Corbett, 2003, Arch Intern Med, 163, 1009
  70. Nyblade, 2003, Disentangling HIV and stigma in Ethiopia, Tanzania and Zambia
  71. De Villiers, 1991, S Afr J Ethnology, 14, 69
  72. Trostle, 1988, Soc Sci Med, 27, 1299

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Related

See all

Metadata

Authors
Munro, S. A., Lewin, S. A., Smith, H. J., Engel, M. E., Fretheim, A., & Volmink, J.
Affiliations
  • South African Medical Research Council (ZA)
  • Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (GB)
  • Nasjonalt Kunnskapssenter for Helsetjenesten (NO)
ORCID
Venue
PLoS Medicine
Publisher
Public Library of Science (PLoS)
Published
2007-07-24
Volume
4
Issue
7
Pages
e238
ISSN
  • 1549-1277 (ISSN-L)
  • 1549-1676
DOI
10.1371/journal.pmed.0040238
PMC
PMC1925126
OpenAlex
W2125168028
Cited by
1,080
References
76
Citations by year
2026: 53 · 2025: 59 · 2024: 62 · 2023: 63 · 2022: 59 · 2021: 77 · 2020: 75 · 2019: 63 · 2018: 65 · 2017: 56 · 2016: 75 · 2015: 66 · 2014: 64 · 2013: 63 · 2012: 53
FWCI
3.35
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • PLoS Medicine (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (publishedVersion)
  • LSHTM Research Online (London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine) (acceptedVersion)
  • BIBSYS Brage (BIBSYS (Norway)) (submittedVersion)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
  • Figshare (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • Open University of Cape Town (University of Cape Town) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • Research Explorer (The University of Manchester) (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
  • Medical Research Council
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Infectious Diseases › Tuberculosis Research and Epidemiology
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Family Practice › Medication Adherence and Compliance
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Infectious Diseases › HIV/AIDS Research and Interventions
Keywords
tuberculosis, medication adherence, barriers to adherence, facilitators of adherence, patient perspectives, caregivers, healthcare workers, financial burden of treatment, adverse effects, poverty, gender discrimination, social support, patient-centered interventions, HIV/AIDS
MeSH terms
Humans, Patient Compliance, Tuberculosis, Outcome Assessment, Health Care, Qualitative Research

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review