Policy and Practice Recommendations: towards enhancing the patient-centred approach
Patient knowledge, understanding and hope	Increase the availability of information to patients at different stages of the treatment course (beyond point of diagnosis) Patient information should also include a range of formats, including peer-to-peer and interactive Increase community-level sensitisation on MDR-TB Expand peer support services for MDR-TB patients Counsellor support should be made available to patients, tailored to meet individual psychosocial support needs, including the option for family engagement and to support gendered experiences which can influence treatment-taking
Patient autonomy and control over treatment-taking	Practitioner-patient relationships should facilitate dialogue so patients feel able to discuss any challenges, concerns and queries they might have Offer practitioner training and engagement on communication Offer support for practitioners who may face challenges with the burden of workload and responsibility for achieving successful patient outcomes
Patient perceptions of the self, body, treatment and disease on tolerance – drug side effects	Offer support for patients around mind set and treatment-taking – as focusing on positives and seeing treatment as strength-giving was found to offer the potential to ease difficult drug side effects Employment of visualisation techniques and distractions from treatment could also support patients with drug tolerance