Methods:
A cross sectional study was conducted among 4900 TB patients who were in the first monthof anti-TB treatment in primary public health care clinics in three districts in South Africa.Quality of life was assessed using the social functioning (SF)-12 Health Survey through faceto face interviews. Associations of physical health (Physical health ComponentSummary = PCS) and mental health (Mental health Component Summary = MCS) wereidentified using linear regression analyses.
Results:
The overall physical and mental health scores were 42.5 and 40.7, respectively. Emotionalrole, general health and bodily pain had the lowest sub-scale scores, while energy and fatigueand mental health had the highest domain scores. Independent Kruskal-Wallis tests foundsignificant positive effects of being TB-HIV co-infected on the domains of mental healthfunctioning, emotional role, energy and fatigue, social function and physical role, whilesignificant negative effects were observed on general health, bodily pain and physicalfunction. In multivariable analysis higher educational, lower psychological distress, havingfewer chronic conditions and being HIV negative were significantly positively associatedwith PCS, and low poverty, low psychological distress and being HIV positive werepositively significantly associated with MCS.
Conclusion:
TB and HIV weaken patients’ physical functioning and impair their quality of life. It isimperative that TB control programmes at public health clinics design strategies to improvethe quality of health of TB and HIV co-infected patients.