The unit of NTP is known as District Tuberculosis Programme (DTP). The name is derived from the area, as each unit covers a district which is geographically, administratively, politically independent. The performance of the DTP from its inception till 1977-78 was monitored continuously by two centres, Northern Regional Centre (NRC) and Southern Regional Centre (SRC) situated in north and south India respectively. Later on in 1978 when these centres were abolished, National Tuberculosis Institute (NTI) was given the responsibility of monitoring the programme in the entire country. NTI monitors the performance of the programme through the quarterly and annual reports received from DTPs. The results of cohort analysis based on treatment cards of patients under DTP, are reported by the DTC through annual reports, which needs expertise. As a result, not only limited number of reports are received but also some of them are not up to the mark. Hence, it was felt to have a base line study of cohort analysis of treatment pattern of various categories of TB patients treated under DTPs. With the assistance from WHO, a pilot study was carried out in two districts of Mysore & Hassan of Karnataka State for the cohort period of Jan Dec 1991. On the basis of District Case Index Registers, 4053 treatment cards were collected from both the DTPs, of which 3877 were considered for analysis.

Results of analysis are being given separately for each district. In Hassan out of 1564 patients, 259 (16.5%) were smear positive, 1256 (80.3%) suspect cases and 49 (3.1%) extra pulmonary cases. The treatment completion rates for different categories of patients were: smear positive treated with SR 26.2%, with SCC 47.5%, suspect cases 23.3% and extra pulmonary 51%. In Mysore district, there were 2313 patients. Of them, 203 (8.8%) were smear positive, 1706 (73.8%) suspect cases and 275 (11.9%) extra pulmonary. Treatment completion rates for smear positive treated with SR 17%, with SCC 43.8%, X-ray suspect cases 18.8% and extra pulmonary 24.7%. Information on outcome of treatment i.e., cure rates, deaths etc., could not be collected due to incomplete recordings on the treatment cards. It could be concluded that a very small percentage of smear positive cases were detected. Treatment completion rates were very poor for all the categories of patients. There was no difference in the treatment completion rates obtained from the study and reported by these centres to NTI through annual report.