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Janet C. Mohle-Boetani, MD,MPH; Jennifer Flood, MD,MPH

JAMA. 2002;287:1040-1042.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

The incidence of tuberculosis (TB) in the United States has steadily declined over the past 9 years.¹ However, disease outbreaks and pediatric cases continue to occur, indicating the ongoing transmission of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. To continue to control TB transmission and prevent outbreaks, a major priority is to improve contact investigations. While the basic steps for contact investigations are well established, implementation of these steps can be challenging.

In this issue of THE JOURNAL, Reichler and colleagues² describe contact investigations conducted in 1996 in 5 areas of the United States that, in the authors' opinion, had the "best-established contact investigation programs and best-organized records." Their study revealed many deficiencies in the conduct of these investigations. First, although contact investigations should be conducted for all infectious TB patients, the authors found no record of a contact investigation for 3% of patients. Second, although all . . . [Full Text of this Article]

Author Affiliations: Disease Investigations and Surveillance Branch (Dr Mohle-Boetani) and Tuberculosis Control Branch (Dr Flood), Division of Communicable Disease Control, California Department of Health Services, Berkeley.

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