Consumption of healthcare services and antibiotics in patients with presumed disseminated Lyme borreliosis before and after evaluation of an infectious disease specialist.

Abstract Our objective was to study the consumption of healthcare services and antibiotics in patients with suspicion of disseminated Lyme borreliosis (LB) before and after consultation of an infectious disease specialist. We evaluated retrospectively all presumed disseminated LB patients (n = 256) with a referral to the Department of Infectious Diseases (DID) in Helsinki University Hospital in 2013. Medical records from all healthcare providers in the area were reviewed and the number of physician contacts because of symptoms leading to LB suspicion and antimicrobial purchases were calculated 1 year before and after consultation or treatment at the DID. Patients were divided into three groups according to certainty of LB: unlikely, possible or probable/definite LB. The number of healthcare contacts 1 year before referral was higher among 121 patients with unlikely LB (6; interquartile range [IQR] 3–10), than 65 possible (4; IQR 2.5–7; p = 0.018) or 66 probable/definite LB patients (4; IQR 2.8–7; p = 0.010). The median number of contacts to healthcare during one year after consultation or treatment was 3 (IQR 0.5–7), 1 (IQR 0–3) and 0.5 (IQR 0–2.3), respectively, with a statistically significant difference between the groups (p