FDC comes as a relief to TB patients

Manav Mander

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Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, February 9

Good news for tuberculosis (TB) patients as they no longer have to pop up a fistful of pills every day.

Reason: A fixed dose combination (FDC) has come to their rescue as it contains four molecules in a single pill. It has been prepared by using all drugs that TB patients used to take for treatment.

FDC will be available for patients from this month onwards.

Many patients leave their treatment in between because of a number of tablets they have to swallow everyday and when they again start the course, they become drug resistant making it all the more difficult to treat TB.

“FDC will reduce the pill burden and increase drug compliance as a patient currently has to take seven different pills as part of the treatment protocol. The staff is undergoing training and FDC will be made available to patients within this month only. First, it will be made available for patients suffering both from HIV and TB and later, it will be extended to all patients,” said Dr Rajiv Bhalla, civil surgeon.

Much to the relief of patients, TB patients no longer would be required to visit DOT centre to take their dose of medicine every day. Now, they would be given fixed dose combination tablets for a month.

“HIV-positive patients are more vulnerable to infections and that is the reason why a majority of HIV-positive patients are suffering from TB. The immune system of HIV-positive patients is very weak and that is the reason why a fixed dose combination drug has been first made available to them,” said an employee at the department of tuberculosis of the Civil Hospital.

Fixed dose medicine will prove a big relief to patients. “It becomes very difficult to swallow 7-8 tablets a day and sometimes it also results in nausea and vomiting. Fixed dose medicine will be a relief from multiple doses of medicines,” said a patient suffering from TB.