A user-friendly, open-source tool to project impact and cost of diagnostic tests for tuberculosis.

ABSTRACT: Most models of infectious diseases, including tuberculosis (TB), do not provide results customized to local conditions. We created a dynamic transmission model to project TB incidence, TB mortality, multidrug-resistant (MDR) TB prevalence, and incremental costs over 5 years after scale-up of nine alternative diagnostic strategies. A corresponding web-based interface allows users to specify local costs and epidemiology. In settings with little capacity for up-front investment, same-day microscopy had the greatest impact on TB incidence and became cost-saving within 5 years if delivered at $10/test. With greater initial investment, population-level scale-up of Xpert MTB/RIF or microcolony-based culture often averted 10 times more TB cases than narrowly-targeted strategies, at minimal increme

SUBMITTER: Dowdy DW 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4082287 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature