Capitol starts TB control program

CITY OF SAN FERNANDO --- Starting this month, the Pampanga Provincial Health Office (PHO) will implement the tuberculosis (TB) control program among children aged zero to 14 years old in the province.
According to Sevilla Tangcuangco, nurse IV and TB in adult and children coordinator of the PHO, the program is in line with one of the country’s Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which aims to achieve a TB free Philippines by year 2015.
Tangcuangco said that it is of utmost importance that children be included in the TB control program since they would later become the adult TB patients.
It has been years since the government has been implementing the TB program solely for adults, but starting this month, the children will be included in the said program.
To ensure that the frontliners of the programs are better equipped with necessary knowledge and skills and prepared for its implementation, the PHO, according to Tangcuangco, conducted necessary orientations and trainings for doctors, nurses and midwives.
More than 100 doctors and nurses in the province attended the four batches of four-day trainings while 326 midwives participated in the 15 batches of one-day orientation activities on the said TB program.
These health workers were given inputs on identification of TB in children, its prevention, administering treatment, reporting and recording including practicum on tuberculin skin testing and reading for doctors and nurses.
The said activities were conducted at the Center for Health and Development (CHD) at the Regional Government Center and in one of the establishments in the City of San Fernando.
Under the program, the Department of Health (DOH) national office will provide TB children patients with needed medicines.
Meanwhile, the Pampanga provincial government will provide P550,900 fund augmentation for the implementation of the anti-TB program for 2009, Tangcuangco said.
Tuberculosis ranked seventh among the causes of mortality and placed 17th as the cause of sickness in the province.
Tuberculosis is classified as either pulmonary TB which is characterized by the formation of lesions mainly in the lungs and extra-pulmonary TB which pertains to TB of body organs other than the lungs.
Records show that in 2008, a total of 1,962 adults and 147 children were afflicted with tuberculosis.
The PHO will start the distribution of TB medicines to the 41 rural health units in the province for the free use of zero to 14 years old children who suffer at least three of the signs and symptoms of the said disease.
These symptoms include cough/wheezing for two weeks or more; unexplained fever of two weeks or more after common causes such as malaria or pneumonia have been excluded; loss of appetite or failure to gain weight, weight loss or weight faltering; failure to respond to two weeks of appropriate antibiotic therapy for lower respiratory tract infection; failure to regain previous state of health two weeks after a viral infection; and fatigue or reduced playfulness or lethargy.
Other factors considered are those with contacts in the house who are sputum positive and children who tested positive in the tuberculin skin test. (pampangacapitol.com)