[Recent status and control measurement of tuberculous patients in the aged].

Percentage of aged patients tends to increase year by year in Japan. The mortality and incidence of tuberculous cases is still higher among the aged 60 years or more, those of male are about two times higher than of female. A survey was made on the newly registered tuberculosis patients in Osaka Prefectural health centers during the periods from January 1 to December 31 in 1984, 1987, 1989 respectively. It was the survey regarding their background factors such as sex, age group, occupation, type of tuberculosis, previous history of tuberculosis, bacteriological findings at registry, mode of detection, history of X-ray examinations, X-ray classification of tuberculosis at detection, symptoms, patient's delay, doctor's delay, kinds of first visiting medical facilities and kinds of diagnostic ones, the number of family members living together and tuberculous history of family living together, etc. The coverage by the survey was 80.9% in 1984, 86.9% in 1987, 86.7% in 1989 for the newly registered cases. The proportion of patients with previous history of tuberculosis was higher in the aged groups of 60 and over than in the other age groups. The proportion of patients detected by visiting doctors was higher in the aged groups than the other age groups. The rate of taking chest X-ray examinations during past one year was lower in the aged than the young age groups. The proportions of the cavitary tuberculosis was higher in the aged than the young groups.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)