Digital Health Support in Treatment for Tuberculosis

c e Digital Health Support in Treatment for TuberculosisTo the Editor: Improving support for patients with tuberculosis is a major priority for governments and development agencies.1 Digital health interventions have the potential to address shortfalls in the current standard of care. 2 Although access to the Internet, smartphones, and other forms of technology is still limited in areas with a high tuberculosis burden, mobile "feature" phones (i.e., phones that lack the advanced functionality of smartphones but can be used to make calls, send text messages, and access some simple Internet features through a text-based interface) are ubiquitous.3 We therefore developed a digital health platform that was compatible with feature phones to provide support for patients with tuberculosis.Each day, patients received a text message asking them to verify adherence to treatment.Such interactive messaging approaches have shown more promise for promoting adherence than one-way reminders.4 If the patient did not verify adherence, two additional messages were sent to the patient at 1-hour intervals, followed by messages and then phone calls from study team members who had personal experience of successful completion of treatment for tubercu-Massachusetts