Predicting the impact of patient and private provider behavior on diagnostic delay for pulmonary tuberculosis patients in India: A simulation modeling study.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Tuberculosis (TB) incidence in India continues to be high due, in large part, to long delays experienced by patients before successful diagnosis and treatment initiation, especially in the private sector. This diagnostic delay is driven by patients' inclination to switch between different types of providers and providers' inclination to delay ordering of accurate diagnostic tests relevant to TB. Our objective is to quantify the impact of changes in these behavioral characteristics of providers and patients on diagnostic delay experienced by pulmonary TB patients.

Methods and findings

We developed a discrete event simulation model of patients' diagnostic pathways that captures key behavioral characteristics of providers (time to order a test) and patients (time to

SUBMITTER: Deo S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7224455 | biostudies-literature | 2020 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature