Multicomponent Strategy with Decentralized Molecular Testing for Tuberculosis​

Dr. Achilles Katamba MBChB, DCH, MSc PhD is a senior Lecturer in the Department of Medicine, College of Health Sciences at Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda. He is a Clinical Epidemiologist with over fifteen years of experience in the design, conduct and implementation of health services research in hospital and community based settings in Uganda. He serves as the Ugandan head of the Uganda TB Implementation Research Consortium (U-TIRC - https://www.u-tirc.org) that focuses on improving TB diagnosis and care by undertaking high-quality clinical, epidemiological and implementation science research that seeks to identify barriers to TB evaluation, to develop implementation strategies to address the barriers, and to evaluate the impact and effectiveness of these strategies at different health facilities in Uganda. He is also responsible for providing administrative support critical to the implementation of the National Institutes of Health Fogarty International Center grant supporting the Pulmonary Complications of AIDS Research Training (PART) Program (https://www.u-tirc.org/part) which seeks to mentor Ugandan investigators to improve translational research skills at Makerere University.​

Dr Katamba will be presenting the results of a cluster-randomized trial, recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine, in which Ugandan community health centers were assigned to a multicomponent diagnostic strategy (on-site molecular testing for TB, guided restructuring of clinic workflows, and monthly feedback of quality metrics) or routine care (on-site sputum-smear microscopy and referral-based molecular testing).​