Doctor of Medical Sciences and Deputy Director of Scientific and Medical Studies of the Central Research Institute of Tuberculosis, phthisiatrist Oksana Komissarova told socialbites.ca that the drug-resistant form of tuberculosis does not respond to traditional tuberculosis treatment.
In Russia, testing Mycobacterium tuberculosis for drug resistance is mandatory, which makes it possible to choose effective treatment.
“Until recently, MDR-tuberculosis (multidrug resistance) treatment lasted 18-24 months. This is too long. But recent scientific studies prove the effectiveness of shortening the duration of treatment when using new anti-tuberculosis drugs. Thus, the treatment was reduced to 9-12 months,” said Komissarova.
Today, modern phytiology has obtained new anti-tuberculosis drugs that can eliminate Mycobacterium tuberculosis. These are, for example, linezolid, bedaquiline, delamanid. According to Komissarova, a combination of various drugs is mandatory – this way doctors act on various targets of the pathogen.
However, sometimes to treat patients with tuberculosis, surgical intervention is used, designed to eliminate those types of tuberculosis that cannot be treated with drugs alone.
“It all depends on the size of the lesion, its location and the patient’s condition. The surgeon may perform lung resection, in which one or more segments are removed. It is also possible to perform pneumonectomy – this is the complete removal of one lung in a common procedure. Of course, in this case the patient’s overall respiratory function decreases,” he said.
Learn more about how drug resistance to tuberculosis developed, how it is treated in Russia today, and why you should not self-medicate if you have a prolonged phlegmy cough – in report Komissarova “socialbites.ca”.
It was like that before named Number of Russians with treatment-resistant tuberculosis.