The role of diet in the treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis - An evaluation in a controlled chemotherapy study in home and sanatorium patients in South India.
Ramakrishnan, C.V.; Kanthi Rajendran; George Jacob, P.; Wallace Fox; Radhakrishna, S.
Bulletin of the World Health Organization; 1961; 25; 339-359 and Indian Journal of Tuberculosis; 1962; 9; 50-70 .
Before the advent of anti-tuberculosis chemotherapy, a diet rich in calories, proteins, fats, minerals and vitamins was generally considered to be an important, if not essential, factor in the treatment of tuberculosis. The introduction of specific anti-tuberculosis drugs, however, has so radically altered the management of the disease that the role of diet has to be reconsidered in the light of the recent advances in treatment. An evaluation of the influence of diet in the treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis with isoniazid plus p-aminosalicyclic acid was recently undertaken by the Tuberculosis Chemotherapy Centre, Madras, in the course of a controlled comparison of home and sanatorium chemotherapy for tuberculosis patients from a poverty-stricken community in Madras City. Despite the fact that during the year of treatment the home patients subsisted on a markedly poorer diet, were physically more active and, on the average gained less weight than the sanatorium patients, the overall response to treatment in the home series closely approached that in the sanatorium series, although there was a tendency for tubercle bacilli to disappear earlier in the latter. Direct evidence has been presented that none of the dietary factors studied (calories, carbohydrates, total and animal proteins, fats minerals and vitamins) appears to influence the attainment of quiescent disease among tuberculous patients treated for one year with an effective combination of antimicrobial drugs, and that initial chemotherapy of patients at home can be successful even if the dietary intake is low throughout the period of treatment.
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