Definitions and reporting framework for tuberculosis – 2013 revision: updated December 2014 and January 2020

Overview

Standardization of definitions and reporting structures has permitted uniformity in the reporting of indicators of performance of national TB control programmes for many years. This document revises previous WHO standard case definitions for TB and drug-resistant TB, the categories used to assign outcomes, and the standard reporting framework for TB.

WHO-approved rapid molecular diagnostics have been widely introduced since the previous definitions and reporting framework were published, and the treatment of drug-resistant TB has been scaled up, necessitating adjustments in the way cases and outcomes are now defined and reported.

Update, December 2014

The reporting of TB/HIV (Block 4 of the “Quarterly report on TB case registration in the basic management unit” and Blocks 1 and 2 of the “Quarterly report on TB treatment outcomes in the basic management unit”) was changed to focus on new and relapse TB cases only. This was to ensure consistency with the 2015 update of the guide to monitoring and evaluation for collaborative TB/HIV activities, published in February 2015.

Update, January 2020

The definition of WHO-approved rapid diagnostics was extended to include biomarker-based techniques. This allows cases diagnosed using the lateral flow urine lipoarabinomannan assay (LF-LAM) to be recorded as bacteriologically confirmed subject to conditions defined in WHO guidelines.

• Arabic Version
• Chinese Version
• Russian Version
• Questions and answers about the definitions and reporting framework
• List of indicators