Patient Knowledge on Self­-Management and Level of Asthma Control in Sulaimani

Abstract

Background 
 Asthma is a common clinical Condition, its inflammatory disorder of air passage in which many cell and elements play a role, its non-communicable, non-curable, reversible obstructive airway disease. Most of the patients with asthma are not well controlled according to guidelines. The best way for management bronchial asthma is to control the disease, once asthma is controlled, it allows patients to do everything just like a normal healthy person, this might be achieved by good knowledge about the disease, because asthma may affect anyone regardless age, education level, and location.
 Objectives
 The goal of the study is to identify how asthma knowledge differs among groups of people and find out the relationship between the patient's knowledge and their level of asthma control in Sulaimani.
 Patients and Methods
 A cross-sectional study with randomized sample was collected from one hundred asthmatic patients in Sulaimani, using questionnaires filled in via a direct interview which consisted of three parts: 1- sociodemographic, 2- asthma knowledge, and 3- asthma control test. The relationship between asthma knowledge and demographic factors and asthma control levels was determined. The collected data were reviewed and analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social sciences (SPSS version 22). P value was obtained for the continuous variable using chi square, and considered significant if it was less than 0.05.
 Results 
 The asthma knowledge was adequate, only 0.9% of these patients had a good knowledge, 58% had adequate knowledge, and 33% had poor knowledge. Most participants (62%) had poor asthma control, 35% had partial control, and only 3% had complete control. The higher the patient’s level of control, the better the asthma knowledge scores, Conversely, patients with better knowledge of asthma had better asthma control based on the Asthma Control Test score (p= 0.001). Also, a higher education level was associated with more asthma control level (p=0.001).
 Conclusion
 In these patients, the level of asthma control was low and significantly correlated with the level of asthma knowledge. There is a clear need to improve knowledge in order to improve asthma control in Sulaimani.