Epidemiological perspective of drug resistant extrapulmonary tuberculosis

Abstract

Tuberculosis (TB) remains one of the leading infectious diseases causing significant morbidity and mortality worldwide. Although, pulmonary TB is the most common presentation and is the main transmissible form of the disease, extrapulmonary TB also significantly contributes to the burden of disease and can cause severe complications and disabilities. At present, the most serious issue with TB control programme is emergence of multi and extensively drug resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis strain world-wide. As the number of drug resistant pulmonary TB is increasing around the world, the number of drug resistant TB with extrapulmonary manifestations are also on rise. However, there is surprisingly scant information in medical literatures on prevalence and impact of extrapulmonary drug-resistant TB. Here, we appraise the recent epidemiological studies that underpin the status and impact of drug resistance in TB cases with extrapulmonary manifestations.