Increasing Notifications of Tuberculosis From Private Practitioners

As part of advancing Public-Private Mix (PPM), the government made TB notification mandatory in 2016, but intervention is likely to be needed for notifications to increase substantially. Such intervention needs to be based on a sound understanding of contextual factors around PPs and how they relate to the public sector with respect to the diagnosis, treatment and reporting of TB cases.

This is a cluster randomised controlled trial of a multi-component public health intervention to increase notifications of TB from PPs in Bandung, Indonesia. Clusters are CHC areas and the intervention will be administered directly to PPs in sub-districts randomised to the intervention arm. The CHCs in both arms will be informed about the study and asked, through the National TB Control Programme, to make their notification data available and their willingness will be recorded. No intervention will be given to PPs in the control arm. Notifications will be obtained directly from routine records, with accompanying information gathered about the address of the patient and referring doctor. Notified TB cases are, by definition, TB cases who have been commenced on TB treatment, noting that some referred 'TB cases' will be diagnosed as not having TB by CHC staff.

The intervention will be administered to PPs in areas around 15 CHCs (clusters), at their place of practice. PPs in the control areas will receive no intervention. The intervention will comprise: (1) An electronic referral and notification system; (2) Education about signs and symptoms of TB and TB management; (3) An individualised practitioner plan for diagnostic and management pathways.

The primary endpoint is the change in the number of notifications of TB from the 12 months before to the 12 months after the intervention is fully implemented. This change in the number of notifications will be compared between intervention clusters and control clusters.

Safety oversight by a Data and Safety Monitoring Board (DSMB) will not be required for this public health intervention trial. However, an internal Data Monitoring Committee (DMC) will be established to oversee the study, focused on data quality. A quality management plan will be developed to describe a site's quality management. Quality control (QC) procedures will be implemented beginning with the data entry system and data QC checks that will be run on the database will be automatically generated on a weekly basis and any quality issues identified will be reviewed by the DMC and a plan put in place for resolution. Following written Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), visiting investigators will verify that the trial is conducted and data are generated, documented (recorded), and reported in compliance with the protocol. The investigational site will provide direct access to all source data/documents, and reports for the purpose of the verification visits.

Inclusion criteria

• All medically qualified private practitioners (PPs) in the intervention arm who reported having diagnosed at least one TB case in the past 3 months
• Intend to work in the current location for the duration of the study as their primary place of private practice

Exclusion criteria

• Unable to use an electronic device for referral/notification
• More than 3 months of non-practice during the study period is anticipated
• They are not a qualified medical practitioner, with the appropriate medical authority in Indonesia