title: Pre-travel advice seeking from GPs by travellers with chronic illness seen at a travel clinic.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Travellers are ageing and frequently report chronic illness. Pre-travel health advice is crucial, particularly in this subgroup, and general practitioners (GPs) are first in line for treatment adjustment before departure. Our aim is to evaluate pre-travel health advice seeking from GPs by travellers with chronic illness seen at a travel clinic.
  
  
  METHODS
  A cross-sectional observational survey using a questionnaire was conducted between August 2013 and July 2014 in travellers attending the travel medicine clinic of a tertiary university hospital in France.
  
  
  RESULTS
  During the study, 2019 travellers were included. Mean age was 39.4 years (±18.8). Three hundred and ninety-one (19.4%) travellers reported a history of a chronic illness. Arterial hypertension and diabetes mellitus were the most frequently reported illnesses, affecting, respectively, 168 (8.3%) travellers and 102 (5.1%). Hajj pilgrims were more likely to report a history of chronic illness than other travellers. Only 810 (40.1%) travellers sought pre-travel advice from their GP. Six hundred and fifty-two (40.1%) healthy travellers and 158 (40.5%) travellers reporting chronic illness sought pre-travel advice from their GP (P = 0.96).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Travellers with a history of chronic illness do not seek pre-travel health advice from their GP more frequently than healthy travellers. Travel health specialists are generally not the best practitioners to manage the care of underlying medical conditions presenting risks during travel. However, GPs offer continuity and disease management expertise to improve the specificity of pre-travel planning. Thus, ongoing collaboration between the traveller, GP and travel health specialist is likely to yield the best outcomes.
authors.affiliation: Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, Travel Clinic, University Hospital of Saint-Etienneand amandine.gagneux-brunon@chu-st-etienne.fr.
authors.forename: Amandine
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Gagneux-Brunon
authors.affiliation: Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, Travel Clinic, University Hospital of Saint-Etienneand.
authors.forename: Carole
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Andrillat
authors.affiliation: Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, Travel Clinic, University Hospital of Saint-Etienneand.
authors.forename: Pascale
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Fouilloux
authors.affiliation: Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, Travel Clinic, University Hospital of Saint-Etienneand.
authors.forename: Fatiha
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Daoud
authors.affiliation: Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, Travel Clinic, University Hospital of Saint-Etienneand.
authors.forename: Christiane
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Defontaine
authors.affiliation: Department of Family Medicine, School of Medicine, University of Saint-Etienne, 55 Avenue Albert Raimond, Saint-Etienne 42055, France.
authors.forename: Rodolphe
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Charles
authors.affiliation: Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, Travel Clinic, University Hospital of Saint-Etienneand.
authors.forename: Frédéric
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Lucht
authors.affiliation: Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, Travel Clinic, University Hospital of Saint-Etienneand.
authors.forename: Elisabeth
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Botelho-Nevers
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000554:Ambulatory Care Facilities; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D002908:Chronic Disease / Q000453:epidemiology*; D003376:Counseling; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D019468:Disease Management; D005260:Female; D005602:France; D058005:General Practitioners; D000066505:Help-Seeking Behavior; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D016015:Logistic Models; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D062606:Tertiary Care Centers; D014195:Travel; D057236:Travel Medicine; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Chronic illness; general practioners; pre-travel health advice; travellers