Clinical profiles and outcomes of pulmonary tuberculosis patients with delayed treatment at a tertiary hospital in South Korea

Background: Data on the clinical characteristics of delayed treatment initiation among pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) patients are lacking. Thus, this study aimed to identify the factors associated with delayed treatment in culture-confirmed pulmonary TB and to assess outcomes of delayed treatment. Methods: We retrospectively evaluated 151 patients with culture-confirmed pulmonary TB between 2015 and 2017. Delayed and timely treatment was defined as initiation of anti-TB treatment after and before the identification of Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex isolate, respectively. Factors related to delayed treatment, such as comorbidities, clinical presentation, and patterns of initial healthcare use, were collected. We analyzed whether delayed treatment was associated with all-cause mortality using a multivariate binary logistic regression model adjusted for age, sex, cardiovascular disease, and malignancy. Results: In total, 55 (36.4%) patients had delayed treatment. The median length between the first medical visit and treatment initiation was 9 days. Compared with timely treatment, delayed treatment was associated with no initial visit to a non-pulmonary department [adjusted odds ratio (aOR) =10.49, 95% confidence interval (CI), 2.56–42.93] and absence of nucleic acid amplification test (aOR =7.54, 95% CI, 2.75–20.67). After adjusting for age, sex, cardiovascular disease, and solid malignancies, delayed treatment was significantly associated with all-cause mortality (aOR =3.79, 95% CI, 1.36–10.58). The most frequent possible cause of delayed treatment was the doctor’s low suspicion of active TB disease. Conclusions: Given that delayed treatment is associated with worse outcomes in South Korea, targeted interventions to increase awareness on TB in the healthcare community are necessary for additional mycobacterial tests and consults of suspicious patients to TB specialists.