PREVALENCE OF TUBERCULOSIS AND DIABETES MELLITUS COMORBIDITIES IN JEMBER: AN ECOLOGICAL ANALYSIS

Abstract

Tuberculosis (TB) is a communicable disease primarily linked to diabetes mellitus (DM) comorbidity. Jember is a district with the second highest TB burdens in East Java Province. It was important to understand the prevalence TB-DM comorbidities in order to develop a strategic program to eliminate TB in Jember. The objective of this study was to identify the prevalence of TB and DM comorbidity in areas of Jember. The study used ecological analysis of the Jember District’s health profile in 2020 which involved 50 public health centers across 31 sub-districts. The data contained the number of TB prevalence, DM prevalence, and TB-DM comorbidities prevalence while the ecology variables were the aggregate of poor households, population density, Posbindu or the integrated development post, health sanitary access, adult health screening, and elderly health screening per sub-district of Jember. The highest prevalence of TB was found in the Kaliwates Sub-district which is the downtown Jember District. Another area with a high prevalence of DM cases was Sumbersari which was also an urban area. Notably, the lowest prevalence of TB and DM cases was found in Jelbuk which was in a rural area in the north of Jember. The study concluded there were strong correlation between DM and TB prevalence, population density and TB, and both health sanitary access and adult health screening with TB, DM, and adult health screening was correlated with TB-DM comorbidities. It was necessary to screen DM patients using a chest x-ray or rapid molecular test method to detect TB and treat its symptoms early.