An Investigation on Leprosy Treatment Patterns, including Disease Prevalence, Adverse Event Monitoring, and Medication Adherence Assessment

Abstract

A prospective observational study was carried out for six months among the leprosy patients in two districts in Telanagana (Ranga Reddy and Hyderabad).The study was carried out to determine the prevalence, treatment pattern and drug related problems among the leprosy patients. During our study period 40 cases were reported from Hyderabad district and 64 from Ranga Reddy. So the prevalence of leprosy in Hyderabad and Ranga Reddy district was found to be 0.001 and 0.002 respectively. In the current study among among a total of 104 patients included, 49 (47%) were in the age group of 31-50 years. The mean age was 42.13±18.61 years. Nearly 6% of the patients were aged less than 15 showing the transmission is still going on the community. This high prevalence in younger age group calls for more vigorous means of case detection like active search for cases especially in communities known to be leprosy endemic.104 patients were enrolled in the study, of them 74(71%) were males and 30(29%) were females, demonstrating male predominance over female population. There   are   three   important   principles   for   leprosy   work   in   the future. It includes;Sustainability (new cases of leprosy are continuing and many of the consequences are lifelong so our approaches need to be sustainable) , the leprosy workers cannot do everything themselves(they need to work in alliances at all levels with other agencies, other health care workers, social services, communities, patients themselves and their families),Anti-leprosy services need to be integrated with general health and social services(this includes training, primary health care, hospital care, and community based rehabilitation) Finally we would like to emphasize the importance of a proper health education, daily ulcer care and shoe adjustments as systemic therapy and also to prevent the development of new ulcers