Abstract: Objective  To investigate the status of tuberculosis(TB) patient treatment and management among floating population in Anhui province, and to evaluate the effect of Global Fund (GF) interventions in patient’s treatment compliance improvement.  Methods  Data collection used structured questionnaire administered to mobile patients enrolled and completed TB treatment between October 2010 to October 2011 in all 5 GF areas (GF group) and 5 randomly selected non-GF areas (non-GF group) in Anhui province. A total of 229 patients (99.57%, 229/230) completed the survey. They consisted of 111 cases from GF group and 118 from non-GF group. Survey data entry and analysis utilized EpiData 3.1 and SPSS 13.0 statistical software. Main evaluation indicators included rate of missing doses, incidence of adverse reactions, times and type of doctor visits, and patients’ awareness about TB medication. Differences in these indicators among patients from GF versus non-GF groups were tested using Chi-square test and α=0.05 as cut point for refuse or accept null hypothesis.  Results The proportion of patient who had missed prescribed medications accounted for 17.12% (19) and 35.59% (42) in GF (111 in total) group and non-GF(118) group respectively and the difference was statistically significant (χ²＝9.99, P<0.05). Significant difference was also observed in the incidence of adverse reactions between the two groups, 31.82% (35/110) for GF group compared with 47.46% (56/118) for non-GF group (χ²＝5.81, P<0.05）. Follow-up visits happened to 93 patients (83.78%) in the GF group which was significantly higher than that in the non-GF group (71.79%,χ²＝4.72, P<0.05). And the composition of doctors who had performed the follow-up visit was also different. For GF group, doctors from county or township level accounted for 75.27% (70/93), while the same indicator for non-GF group was only 59.52% (50/84) (χ²=5.01,P<0.05). The proportion of GF patients who believed that medication can be stopped if symptoms disappeared after a period of treatment was also significantly lower than that of non-GF patients (3.60% versus 10.81%,χ²＝4.31, P<0.05).  Conclusion  After GF supported interventions, patients’ treatment compliance and correct medication awareness of TB treatment among mobile population in GF areas were significantly better than those of patients in non-GF areas and the incidence of adverse reactions was also lower in GF areas than in non-GF areas.

Key words: Tuberculosis, pulmonary/drug therapy, Medication adherence, Transients and migrants, Anhui province