Considerations for data production > Healthy Canadians >

59-HTL: Incidence rate for tuberculosis

Definition
Rationale and notes for interpretation
Technical specifications
Data availability
Considerations for indicator quality and comparability
Responsibility to produce the data

Definition

Rate of incident cases of new active and relapsed tuberculosis reported by calendar year.

Case definition for reporting to the CTBRS (all cases)

Cases with mycobacterium complex (i.e. M. tuberculosis, M. bovis, excluding BCG strain or M. africanum) demonstrated on culture, or in the absence of bacteriological proof, cases clinically compatible with active tuberculosis that have, for example:

• Chest x-ray changes compatible with active tuberculosis including idiopathic pleurisy with infusion
• Active extrapulmonary tuberculosis (meningeal, bone, kidney, peripheral lymph nodes, etc.)
• Pathologic or post-mortem evidence of active tuberculosis.

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Rationale and notes for interpretation

TB is an important public health problem that has become more prominent in recent years. Incidence is linked to high-risk groups such as recent immigrants, First Nations communities and people co-infected with HIV. Multiple drug resistance is also emerging in Canada.

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Technical specifications

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Data availability

• Report as a rate per 100,000 population per year.
• Data is available from 1990 to 2002.
• Break down by risk group e.g., Canadian born (non-First Nations), First Nations, born outside Canada is useful.
• Break down according to incidence of multiple drug resistant strains is useful.

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Considerations for indicator quality and comparability

Provinces/territories update their reportable disease data frequently, even after Health Canada finalizes the data for a given period, so provinces/territories will always have the most up-to-date data for their respective jurisdictions.

Some data produced for the September 2002 Comparable Health Indicators Reports may have changed due to updated provincial and territorial numbers therefore, data tables provided for the November 2004 Comparable Health Indicators Reports, replaces all previous data tables.

Minor variations in data will occur when comparing data with other federal and provincial/territorial publications because of reporting delays, different cut-off dates and date of access to Statistics Canada's population estimates.

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Responsibility to produce the data

Health Canada