The recommendations and remarks in this policy guideline are the result of the collaborative effort of professionals from a range of specialties and who have extensive expertise and experience in public health policy, programme management as well as in the care of patients with drug-resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB). The World Health Organization (WHO) is grateful for their time and support.
Guideline Development Group
The chairs of the Guideline Development Group (GDG) were Nancy Santesso (GRADE Methodology specialist; Canada) and Kelly Dooley (Clinical Pharmacologist, Infectious Diseases specialist; United States). In addition, the following experts served as members of the GDG: Farhana Amanullah (Paediatrician, clinical practice; Pakistan), Tsira Chakhaia (Patient representative and civil society representative; Georgia), Daniela Cirillo (Laboratory specialist; Italy), Luis Gustavo Do Valle Bastos (Drug management and procurement; Switzerland), Philipp du Cros (Programme manager, clinician; United Kingdom), Raquel Duarte (Programme management, public health; Portugal), Christopher Kuaban (Programme management; Cameroon), Rafael Laniado-Laborin (Clinician (private sector), public health specialist; Mexico), Gary Maartens (Pharmacology; South Africa), Andrei Maryandyshev (Clinician; Russian Federation), Ignacio Monedero-Recuero (Clinician; Spain), Maria Imelda Josefa Quelapio (Clinician, programme implementation; Netherlands), Wipa Reechaipichitkul (Clinician, public health; Thailand), Michael Rich (DR-TB expert; United States), Radojka (Rada) Savic (Pharmacokinetics/pharmacodynamics specialist; United States), Welile Sikhondze (Programme manager; Swaziland), and Armand Van Deun (Microbiologist; Belgium).
External Review Group
We thank the following members of the External Review Group (ERG) for reviewing the final guideline document and providing valuable inputs: Charles L. Daley (Clinical management; United States), Essam Elmoghazi (Programme management; Egypt), James Johnston (Clinical management; Canada), Enos Masini (Programme management, end-user; Kenya), Ingrid Oxley (Patient representative; South Africa), Rohit Sarin (Programme management, end-user; India), Simon Schaaf (Paediatrician; South Africa), Helen Stagg (Academic; United Kingdom), Carlos A. Torres-Duque (Technical agency, clinician; Colombia), Kitty van Weezenbeek (Technical agency, end-user; Netherlands), Irina Vasilyeva (End-user; Russian Federation), and Piret Viiklepp (Programme manager; Estonia).
Observers and external partners
Giovanni Battista Migliori (WHO Collaborating Centre for TB and Lung Diseases; Italy), YaDiul Mukadi (United States Agency for International Development; United States), Payam Nahid (American Thoracic Society; United States) and Timothy Rodwell (FIND; Switzerland), Mohammed Yassin (Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria; Switzerland).
Systematic review team
We acknowledge Richard (Dick) Menzies and Federica Fregonese of McGill University, Canada, for conducting the systematic reviews, coordinating the individual-patient data (IPD) analysis, undertaking the analysis, developing GRADE evidence profiles and presenting these findings to the GDG during the discussions ahead and during the GDG meeting of 27 April 2017.
WHO Guideline Steering Committee
The following staff served as the WHO Steering Committee for the development of the current policy guideline: Dennis Falzon, Medea Gegia, Christopher Gilpin, Lice González-Angulo, Ernesto Jaramillo, Linh Nguyen, Karin Weyer and Matteo Zignol from the WHO Global TB Programme (WHO/GTB); Meg Doherty from the WHO HIV Department; Piero Olliaro from the Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases (TDR); and Edward Kelley from the WHO Service Delivery and Safety Department.
The guideline text was drafted by Dennis Falzon and Lice González-Angulo with contributions from Alexei Korobitsyn, under the guidance and supervision of Ernesto Jaramillo and Karin Weyer, and the overall direction of Mario Raviglione, director of WHO/GTB. The document was reviewed and finalised following the input of the GDG, ERG and the WHO Guideline Steering Committee, ahead of submission to the Guideline Review Committee of WHO (GRC) in June 2017.
Funding
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is acknowledged for its financial support to the guideline development process (GDG meeting; systematic reviews; WHO salary support administration; and guideline production) through the WHO-USAID grant (Grant number GHA-G-00-09-00003/US-2014-827). The consolidation of the database comprising individual level data on patients with isoniazid-resistant TB (Hr-TB) was coordinated by McGill University simultaneously with an update of the IPD analysis on rifampicin-resistant/multidrug-resistant TB (RR-/MDR-TB) outcomes8 which was funded by the American Thoracic Society (ATS), the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) and the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (U.S. CDC). ATS/CDC/IDSA and WHO/GTB agreed to the mutual exchange of results of the two analyses to inform the revision of their respective TB guidelines.
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Ahuja SD, Ashkin D, Avendano M, Banerjee R, Bauer M, Bayona JN, Becerra MC, Benedetti A, Burgos M, Centis R, Chan ED. Multidrug resistant pulmonary tuberculosis treatment regimens and patient outcomes: an individual patient data meta-analysis of 9,153 patients. PLoS Med. 2012 Aug 28;9(8):e1001300.
