Factores involucrados en la adherencia a la inmunoterapia sublingual y subcutánea en pacientes del Servicio de Alergología de una institución de salud en Medellín-Colombia

Introduction. Allergic diseases in the world have increased in the last century, requiring novel treatments to improve the quality of life of patients. As a result, immunotherapy has emerged as a therapeutic option. The aim of this study was to identify aspects of adherence to sublingual (SLIT) and subcutaneous (SCIT) immunotherapy and reasons for non-adherence. Materials and methods. We present a retrospective study of patients with allergic diseases (rhinitis, asthma or atopic dermatitis) who initiated SCIT or SLIT at the allergology clinic in a health institution in Medellin, Colombia. Absolute and relative distributions, descriptive statistics and Chi square test were used for statistical analysis. Results. A total of 144 patients were selected (SCIT=84.7%; SLIT=15.3%). From the total of patients, 38.9% were considered adherent; no significant differences were found in adherence according to the route of administration (p=0.833). The most important reason for selecting the type of immunotherapy was medical recommendation. Of the non-adherent patients, 95.5% (n=84) discontinued the treatment. Sociodemographic characteristics of the two immunotherapy groups were relatively similar, with no significant differences. A significant difference was found between the service provided by the health institution and discontinuation of treatment, being greater for the group treated with SLIT (38.5%; p=0.007). Conclusion. The main cause of discontinuation of immunotherapy was the lack of approval for funding by the Health Promoting Agencies (53.6%). Introducción. Las enfermedades alérgicas en el mundo han aumentado en el último siglo, requiriendo a su vez nuevos tratamientos que permitan mejorar la calidad de vida de los pacientes; como respuesta, la inmunoterapia ha surgido como una opción terapéutica. El objetivo de este estudio fue identificar aspectos de la adherencia a la inmunoterapia sublingual (ITSL) y subcutánea (ITSC), y los motivos de abandono. Materiales y métodos. Estudio descriptivo retrospectivo de pacientes con enfermedades alérgicas (rinitis, asma o dermatitis atópica) que iniciaron inmunoterapia, por vía subcutánea o sublingual, en el Servicio de Alergología de una institución de salud de la ciudad de Medellín, Colombia. Para el análisis estadístico se utilizaron distribuciones absolutas, relativas, medidas de resumen y la prueba Chi cuadrado de independencia. Resultados. Se incluyeron 144 pacientes (ITSC=84,7%;ITSL=15,3%). El 38,9% de los paciente