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

. 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%).