Aim: Tuberculosis is an important health problem in our country as well as the entire world. Tuberculosis dispensary records are important to show the incidence of tuberculosis in our country. In this study, we aimed to evaluate the characteristics of patients with tuberculosis admitted to Malatya Tuberculosis Dispensaries. Material and Methods: The study comprised 470 patients with pulmonary tuberculosis who were followed-up in Malatya Tuberculosis Dispensaries I and II between 2000 and 2002. Mean age of the patients was 33.1±17.0 years, and 18.3% of the patients were illiterate. While 62.6% of the patients were enrolled from the city center of Malatya, 35.3% of the patients were enrolled from rural regions of Malatya. The rate of patients detected by close contact examination was 14.3%. Of all cases, 80.2% were new, 14.3% were relapse and 5.5% were old case. Results: Microbiological examination was done in 67.3% of the patients, and smear positivity was found in 56.4% of the patients. The ratio of treatment completion, cure, treatment success and treatment failure in pulmonary tuberculosis were found 75.7%, 15.7%, 91.5% and 4.5%, respectively. According to the examination of records of relapse cases, the major causes of relapse were irregular treatment, treatment interruption and faulty treatment combinations. Drug susceptibility tests were performed in only seven of these patients, and drug resistance was detected in five cases. Conclusion: Despite the high treatment completion rate in Malatya Tuberculosis Dispensaries, the cure rate was found to be quite low. To improve the cure rates to ideal values, the microbiological examination must be done more frequently in the last months of the treatment, and directly observed treatment must be started.