LIFT-TB Partners Provide Support to Technical and Coordinating Bodies To Support Proper Use of New Regimen

An important activity of the LIFT-TB project has been to build the capacity of the relevant national expert bodies in the respective countries to provide advice and guidance on the management of patients who are thought to be eligible for treatment with the BPaL regimen. This activity in several countries was made easier by the previous support provided by various projects to the building of capacity in said expert bodies for the introduction of new drugs (namely bedaquiline [Bdq] and delamanid [Dlm]), and new regimens (namely Bdq or Dlm containing regimens and the injection-based shorter DR-TB treatment regimen as used in the STREAM study).

For the purposes of coordinating all BPaL-related OR activities across the different projects and partners, under the auspices of the LIFT-TB project, KNCV Tuberculosis Foundation (KNCV) established a global-level coordination mechanism for BPaL OR activities in October 2020. Partners involved include ITRC, KNCV, Stop TB Partnership (GDF and TB REACH), TB Alliance, TDR, South Africa’s NTP and researchers, Viatris (previously Mylan), and WHO (HQ, AFRO and EURO).

From October 2020 to June 2021, monthly calls were held where updates on country and global levels activities and experiences gained were shared amongst the partners involved in BPaL OR globally. Since August 2021, the calls have been held every 2 months, with a total of 4 meetings being held to date (March 2022). 

For complicated cases (whether in routine DR-TB care or under operational research [OR] of a modified all oral shorter DR-TB regimen), in October 2020 WHO EURO created a regional level Virtual Medical Consilium (VMC) to which countries in the region could submit cases for a group of experts to review and provide advice and guidance on their care. One of KNCV’s PMDT consultants was selected in July 2021 to the join the VMC’s group of experts specifically for the purpose of providing advice and guidance to patients receiving BPaL regimen. For those countries who are supported by the LIFT-TB project, but are outside of the WHO EURO Region (to date Indonesia, Myanmar, Nigeria, The Philippines, and Vietnam), the project has established an ad-hoc International TB Expert Committee (currently with alternate experts from KNCV and TB Alliance) for the purpose of providing advice and guidance of patients receiving BPaL in the respective countries.

KNCV organized a workshop and symposium during the 52nd Union World Conference on Lung Health to share implementation experience for countries planning the implementation to benefit from it.