Tanusree Sarkar1, Md. Akhtar-Uz-Zaman2, Md. Abdul Khalique Barbhuiya3, Satya Ranjan Roy4,
Shamrat Adnan Chowdhury5, Md. Shah Alam6, Imran Hussain7
Shamrat Adnan Chowdhury5, Md. Shah Alam6, Imran Hussain7
1. Assistant Professor, Community Medicine, North East Medical College, Sylhet.
2. Senior Lecturer, Community Medicine, North East Medical College, Sylhet.
3. Professor and Head of the Department, Community Medicine, North East Medical College, Sylhet.
4. Associate Professor, Community Medicine, North East Medical College, Sylhet.
5. Lecturer, Community Medicine, North East Medical College, Sylhet.
6. Lecturer, Community Medicine, North East Medical College, Sylhet.
7. Lecturer, Community Medicine, North East Medical College, Sylhet.
Abstract
Tuberculosis (TB) is one of the infectious diseases which is still a global health problem despite of its effective and available treatment. With the emergence of new anti-tubercular drugs, it was expected to be eradicated, but, the global reports didn’t show the similar result. Only the effective treatment regime can’t control this problem, in addition to this, individuals awareness about the disease and social factors should be taken into consideration. This cross-sectional study was aimed at assessing the perception of tuberculosis in rural community of Sylhet, Bangladesh and identifying the associate socio-demographic factors. A total of 112 respondents aged 18 years and above were interviewed by using semi-structured questionnaire. Maximum (31.2%) respondents were in the age group of 26-33 years with mean age group 34-41(SD±1.427) years. Mean monthly family income in 7001-9000 Tk with SD+0.799. Regarding perception about TB, all (100%) the respondents have hard the name of TB. majority (88.4%) of respondents have idea that TB spread person to person and among them 60% knew that it spread through air. Out of 112 respondents 69.64% had idea that TB is a curable disease. Regarding free supply of anti-TB drugs by the Government, 92.90% people were aware about it. In this study perception about free anti-TB drug was found to be associated with total monthly family income (p=0.000) of the respondents. All the respondents had idea about TB but misconceptions do exist.
Key Words: Perception, Tuberculosis, Rural people