Table 3 Risk factors for diagnostic delay

HIV

[10]

[11-13]

Coexistence of chronic cough and/or other lung diseases

[12, 14-16]

[7]

Negative sputum smear

[12, 19, 20]

[15]

Extrapulmonary TB

[7, 17, 18]

Rural residence

[5, 11, 14, 16, 23, 25, 29-32]

Low access to healthcare (geographical or socio-psychological barriers)

[6, 8, 10, 14, 18, 23, 25, 27-30, 34, 42, 47, 48, 50]

Initial visit to government low-level healthcare facility

[5, 6, 9-11, 23, 26, 32-34]

[35]

Initial visit to traditional or unqualified practitioner

[9, 10, 14, 26-29, 32, 36, 37]

Initial visit to private practitioner

[9, 10, 14, 26-29, 32, 36, 37]

Initial visit to tertiary-level services/hospital

[11]

[13, 23, 38, 39]

Old age

[5, 12, 14-16, 19, 23, 24, 26, 38, 40, 41]

[18, 35]

Poverty

[7, 20, 21, 27, 28, 34, 37, 40, 41, 47, 48, 54, 56]

[18]

Female sex

[8, 10, 11, 14-16, 20, 22, 31, 33, 39, 40]

[5, 21, 23, 25]

Alcoholism or substance abuse

[8, 21-25]

History of immigration

[8, 15, 17, 22, 38, 39, 42]

Low educational level and/or low awareness and knowledge about TB

[9, 15-17, 20, 21, 23, 24, 27, 28, 31-33, 38, 39]

[13] (low educational level)

Other

Health-related reasons:

Generally poor health [26]

Smoking [14, 23]

Coexistence of sexually transmitted diseases [26]

Less severe and indifferent symptoms [27]

No haemoptysis [16, 28]

Socioeconomic factors:

Married [5]

Single [18, 26]

Large family size [30]

Farmer [5]

White (vs. aboriginal) [20]

Muslim [18]

Belonging to an indigenous group [13]

No insurance [13]

Beliefs and attitudes:

Beliefs about TB (not curable, caused by evil spirits, etc.) [8, 14, 27]

Stigma [27]

Self-treatment [6, 36, 42]