Impact of COVID-19 pandemic on quality of life and medication adherence among pulmonary Tb patients

Abstract

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has presently overtaken every other health issue throughout the world. There are different ways in which current public health challenges would be impacted by this. Objective: To study on the interaction between COVID-19 and tuberculosis (TB), which still ranks as the leading cause of death from a single infectious disease globally. Methods: A total of 250 Pulmonary Tuberculosis patients from a tertiary dot centre agreed to participate in the survey. The information regarding demographics (age and gender), medication adherence, and quality of life characteristics was collected by interviewing the participants through the questionnaires (MMAS and SGRQ) from the patients by the principal investigator before and during the pandemic. Descriptive statistics used to calculate mean, SD, and P-value. Results: Results from the self-reported HRQOL questionnaires revealed significant impairment in overall HRQOL and domains during the lockdown. Based on the adherence grading of MMAS-8, the majority of TB patients reported a reduced medication adherence rate during the pandemic. Furthermore, there were positive associations between overall SGRQ scores and medication adherence rate during the COVID-19 pandemic as confirmed by statistically significant results. Principle Conclusion: Our examination reasoned components such as medication adherence and QOL of patients with pulmonary tuberculosis. This study showed that more than half of patients reported poor quality of life and reduced medication adherence during the COVID-19 pandemic. A positive relationship exists between adherence and HRQOL among pulmonary TB patients.