Abstract
Introduction: Childhood asthma is an immensely important chronic disease in children with increasing prevalence worldwide. Inhaled corticosteroids and bronchodilators are the key drugs in asthma therapy.Material and Methods: Compliance of childhood asthma was assessed at a tertiary care centre to find out the percentage of compliant Vs noncompliant patients and the reasons for the latter. If the patient had attended at least nine visits (> 75%) the previous year he was labelled compliant and those with less than six visits (<50%) were put in the non-complaint group.Results: Of the 374 patients attending the asthma clinic, 60 were randomly selected for the study of which 53 finally participated. In this study the compliance was 47% and gender predilection did not affect compliance. The distance a patient had to commute to reach the hospital and the mother’s education did not have any influence on the compliance. Older asthmatics exhibited better compliance in our study.Conclusion: Forty percent of our patients were compliant to regular use of prescribed medicine. Older age of the patients and care giver`s awareness about asthma were the two factors which are statistically significant in compliance with drug therapy in asthma. Gender of the patient, academic qualification and distance from the hospital did not have a significant effect on compliance.
Highlights
Childhood asthma is an immensely important chronic disease in children with increasing prevalence worldwide
A total of 374 patients being managed by inhaled corticosteroids were registered at the asthma clinic in our centre
The result depends largely on patient related factors and despite the efforts of the healthcare professionals, the desired outcomes might not be achieved if the patients are non-compliant. This is very pertinent in management of illnesses with long term treatment when compared to a short-term therapy in which the quoted compliance rate is between 70 percent and 80 percent to that of 20–30 percent of the former[7]
Summary
Childhood asthma is an immensely important chronic disease in children with increasing prevalence worldwide. Inhaled corticosteroids and bronchodilators are the key drugs in asthma therapy. Material and Methods: Compliance of childhood asthma was assessed at a tertiary care centre to find out the percentage of compliant Vs noncompliant patients and the reasons for the latter. Older age of the patients and care givers awareness about asthma were the two factors which are statistically significant in compliance with drug therapy in asthma. Academic qualification and distance from the hospital did not have a significant effect on compliance. Inhaled corticosteroids are cornerstone of asthma management in children and adolescents. Inhaled corticosteroids control the airway inflammatory process, result in sustained asthma control, improve asthma symptoms and lung function and reduce frequency of flair ups[2]. Uncontrolled asthma is associated with a reduced pulmonary function, poor performance
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