Using a pilot system we have categorised this review as: Current question - no update intended (Results conclusive). Please see "Published notes" section of the review for more details.
Tuberculosis is a very serious health problem with two million people dying each year, mostly in low-income countries. Effective drugs for tuberculosis have been available since the 1940s, but the problem still abounds. People with tuberculosis need to take the drugs for at least six months, but many do not complete their course of treatment. For this reason, services for people with tuberculosis often use different approaches to encourage people to complete their course of treatment. This review found no evidence that direct observation by health workers, family members, or community members of people taking their medication showed better cure rates that people having self administered treatment. The intervention is expensive to implement, and there appears to be no sound reason to advocate its routine use until we better understand the situations in which it may be beneficial.