Background: The importance of identifying chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) at an early stage is recognised. Improved and easily accessible identification of individuals at risk of COPD in primary care is needed to select patients for spirometry more accurately.

Budesonide/formoterol in a single inhaler is as safe and effective in the long-term treatment of asthma as budesonide plus formoterol via separate inhalers. The lower number of withdrawals with budesonide/formoterol may reflect better adherence to treatment compared with budesonide plus formoterol.

Compared with the 2 x 2 FIX + F treatment the use of budesonide/formoterol was 30-40% lower in the SMART groups while maintaining equal ACQ(5) scores. Daily asthma control improved equally with 2 x SMART compared to 2 x 2 FIX + F with a reduction in asthma medication cost. The one dose once daily maintenance treatment (1 x SMART) resulted in a low level of treatment failure (exacerbations) but led to more days with symptoms. Therefore, a daily dose of two inhalations seems to be the lowest appropriate dose in patients with moderate persistent asthma.

Special attention to COPD, marked by a specialised nurse in primary care improves the quality, as assessed by a lower number of exacerbations. The structure of COPD care in Sweden for diagnosed individuals seems satisfactory, but could be improved mainly through higher availability and educational activities.

SYNOPSIS The prophylactic anti‐migraine effect of atenolol was compared to placebo in a multicentre study on 63 patients with classical and/or common migraine. The study design was double‐blind cross‐over and patients were given atenolol 100 mg o.d. or matching placebo during a study treatment period of 24 weeks. The effect of atenolol was significantly better than that of placebo: integrated headache values were reduced in 70% of the patients (p = 0.004) and the proportion of days with headache was reduced in 59% of the patients (p = 0.010). Few side effects were reported with both atenolol and placebo. This study shows atenolol to be safe and effective in the prophylactic treatment of migraine.