ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION: Endometriosis symptoms are nonspecific and overlap with other gynecologic and gastrointestinal diseases, leading to long diagnostic delays. The burden of endometriosis has been documented; however, little is known about the impact of diagnostic delays on healthcare costs leading up to diagnoses. The purpose of this study was to examine the economic impact of diagnostic delays on pre-diagnosis healthcare utilization and costs among patients with endometriosis. METHODS: This was a retrospective database study of adult patients with a diagnosis of endometriosis from 1 January 2004 to 31 July 2016. Patients had continuous health plan enrollment 60 months prior to and 12 months following the earliest endometriosis diagnosis and ≥ 1 pre-diagnosis endometriosis symptom (dyspareunia, generalized pelvic pain, abdominal pain, dysmenorrhea, or infertility). Patients were assigned to short (≤ 1 year), intermediate (1-3 years), or long (3-5 years) delay cohorts based on the length of their diagnostic delay (time from first symptom to diagnosis). Healthcare resource utilization and costs were calculated and compared by cohort in the 60-month pre-diagnosis period. RESULTS: A total of 11,793 patients were included in the study, of which 37.7% (4446/11,793), 27.0% (3179/11,793), and 35.3% (4168/11,793) had short, intermediate, and long delays, respectively. Patients with intermediate or long diagnostic delays had consistently more all-cause and endometriosis-related emergency visits and inpatient hospitalizations in the pre-diagnosis period than patients with short delays. Pre-diagnosis all-cause healthcare costs were significantly higher among patients with longer diagnostic delays, averaging $21,489, $30,030, and $34,460 among patients with a short, intermediate, and long delay, respectively (p < 0.001 for all pairwise comparisons). Endometriosis-related costs accounted for 12.5% ($3553/$28,376) of all-cause costs and followed a similar pattern. CONCLUSION: Patients with endometriosis who had longer diagnostic delays had more pre-diagnosis endometriosis-related symptoms and higher pre-diagnosis healthcare utilization and costs compared with patients who were diagnosed earlier after symptom onset, providing evidence in support of earlier diagnosis.