Only allopath’s prescription will help buy TB drugs

Only allopath’s prescription will help buy TB drugs

City chemists will be allowed to dispense tuberculosis medication solely on the prescription of an allopathic doctor. This was decided on the last-day meeting of city tuberculosis experts, Indian Medical Association (IMA) members, the Central TB division team and the BMC held at the KEM hospital on Saturday. The Central TB team is in city to review the TB programme. It was after the discovery of 11 cases of XXDR-TB (extensive drug-resistant TB) in the city that the Centre and the state medical authorities began taking serious initiatives towards tackling the deadly disease, which claims two persons every three minutes across the country. Confirming the joint decision, IMA president-elect Dr Anil Pachnekar, who is also the Maharashtra and Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP) state co-ordinator, said, “Chemists should give TB medicines only to patient coming with an allopathy doctor prescription, while doctors of alternative medicine, including homeopathy, ayurveda and Unani, won’t be allowed to prescribe these medicines. They can, however, become DOTS provider.” Further it was decided that only chest physicians would be allowed to treat multi drug resistant-TB (MDR-TB) and extreme drug-resistant TB (XDR-TB). “It was observed that apart from TB patients defaulting on taking medicines, private practitioners too were following poor prescription practice, thus leading to a rise in the number of drug-resistant TB forms,” said Dr Pachnekar, adding that the chest physicians, given their expertise, will be in a better position to handle them. Earlier, a study by PD Hinduja hospital had drawn attention of the TB experts to the poor prescribing practice being a major factor fuelling the MDR-TB epidemic. While appreciating the civic body’s initiative of a door-to door survey and getting the MDR-TB patients to enrol in the RNTCP, the Central TB division team announced a nationwide survey on drug-resistant forms of the disease.