Table 1. Systematic strategy used to search for studies on pre-treatment loss to follow-up in tuberculosis patients.

Set	MEDLINE	Global Health
1	tuberculosis	tuberculosis
2	TB	patient refusal of treatment
3	TUBERCULOSIS	dropout
4	Sets 1–3 were combined with “OR”	dropouts
5	PATIENT DROPOUT	referral
6	DELAYED DIAGNOSIS	delayed
7	REFERRAL AND CONSULTATION	attrition
8	DIAGNOSTIC SERVICES	retain
9	TUBERCULOSIS, PULMONARY DIAGNOSIS	treatment programme
10	initial delay*	initial delay
11	initial default*	initial default
12	drop out	retention
13	attrition	diagnostic delay
14	retention	treatment delay
15	retain*	care seeking
16	diagnostic delay*	loss to follow-up
17	treatment delay*	lost to follow-up
18	treatment seek*	Sets 2–17 were combined with “OR”
19	care seek*	Sets 1 and 18 were combined with “AND”
20	loss to follow-up	Set 19 was limited to 1994–2013
21	lost to follow-up
22	loss to follow-up
23	lost to follow-up
24	Sets 1–23 were combined with “OR”
25	Sets 4 and 24 were combined with “AND”
26	Set 25 was limited to 1994–2013

Note: Words written in capital letters were used as MeSH headings; the others were used as free text. The asterisks are the truncation symbol in Medline (i.e. any possible ending after the preceding text).