Prs46 Assessing Asthma Management in an Urban Community in Delhi, India

Abstract

Background & objectives:High prevalence and poor control of asthma make its management a major public health issue worldwide, especially in developing countries. Optimum review of asthma management in the community is essential to improve asthma control. This study was conducted to investigate the quality of asthma management, knowledge about asthma and quality of life of asthma patients referred to a public tertiary care chest hospital in Delhi.Methods:Diagnosis of asthma was confirmed by symptoms and reversible spirometry in 50 referred patients on their first visit. Patients were interviewed using three questionnaires on quality of asthma management before visiting referral hospital, asthma knowledge and asthma quality of life (AQLQ). Correlation amongst quality of treatment, asthma quality of life, and asthma knowledge was also determined.Results:Findings revealed that only 60 per cent of patients were informed about their disease, and 10 per cent had undergone lung function tests previously. Only 44 per cent of patients were prescribed inhalers. None were provided with any educational material. Patients had poor knowledge of aetiology, pathophysiology, medication and how to assess the severity of their asthma. The mean scores in AQLQ indicated a moderate degree of impairment in quality of life.Interpretations & conclusions:This study provides evidence of unsatisfactory asthma management and patient-doctor interaction as patients had limited knowledge of asthma disease, its management and had poor quality of life as measured by a standardized questionnaire. Thus, there is need to implement suitable interventions to improve asthma management according to standard treatment guidelines in the community.

Prevalence of Self-Reported Respiratory Symptoms, Asthma and Chronic Bronchitis in Slum Area of a Rapidly Developing Indian City

“…Although a part of our definition of asthma was similar to Aggarwal et al, we also included additional symptomatic definition of the disease which was derived from various asthma epidemiological studies [20,21]. We assume that relying only on physician diagnosis of asthma in an epidemiological surveys, although specific, can induce a risk of underestimating a disease in community especially when there is poor understanding of a disease even at the physician level [26]. This could be the reason of low prevalence reported in study by Aggarwal et al, and has falsely placed India in low asthma prevalence zone globally.…”

Prs34 Patient Self-Management of Asthma: A Study in an Emergency Room of a Chest Hospital in Delhi, India

“…Earlier studies have indicated that asthma management and pharmacotherapy is not optimal in the community setting within urban India [16-18]. A recent study showed that asthma patients referred to hospital and treated with pharmacotherapy according to standard treatment guidelines demonstrated improvement in various parameters of asthma control within 2-8 weeks [19].…”

Self care Practices and Quality of life among men and women with Asthma; Health care Facility based study in Telangana, South India.

“…Despite the revolutionary changes in asthma management the morbidity and mortality due to asthma is increasing worldwide 1 . Prevalence of asthma is over 3.5% in adults and over 5.1% in children in our country and the burden is constantly increasing 4 . Asthma is a chronic inflammatory disorder characterized with the intermittent and variable periods of airway obstruction.…”