The impact of screening for tuberculosis exposure in the household in children with tuberculosis disease: A difficult riddle to solve

Background Tuberculosis (TB) infection is transmitted by sharing the same airway with people with active TB. Children are often not considered the source of TB bacilli, and index case investigation is carried out after diagnosis. Here, we describe the impact of the presence of a household index case on childhood TB disease. Methods The data of patients aged between 1 month and 18 years who were diagnosed with TB were collected. We compared patients according to whether they had an index case in the household or not. Results A total of 202 TB patients were enrolled, of whom 62 (30.7%) had a household index case. There was no significant difference in having a household index case between TB patients under the age of five (23.3%) and older children (33.8%) (p = .140). Pulmonary TB was present in 61.4% of the cases, and extrapulmonary TB was present in 38.6% of the cases. The rate of patients who had a household index case was significantly higher in pulmonary TB (46.8%) compared to extrapulmonary TB (5.1%) (p Conclusion Household contact research is an important epidemiological tool. However, considering the contact rates in the household, new and more comprehensive public health programs are required to prevent the spread of childhood tuberculosis.