Non-Interventional, Descriptive, Cross-sectional and Unicentric Study to Describe the Clinical Management in Asthmatic Patients Attended in the Influential Area of Hospital Universitario Virgen de la Victoria, Málaga

Asthma is a heterogenic chronic disease characterized by acute symptomatic episodes of varying severity, including intermittently inflammation and narrowing of the airways in the lungs. The prevalence of this disease is high as affects more than 300 million people worldwide, which varies by country. In Spain, the prevalence it is estimated to be around 5%, ranged between 1% in Huelva and 4,7% in Albacete, according with the European Community Respiratory Survey (ECRHS), and seems to be increased due to a higher rate of asthma diagnosis1.

It's important to note that in this condition there is a substantial proportion of patients with inadequate control of their disease, which conducts to a higher morbidity and mortality2. The poor disease control is associated to an important negative impact in patient's health-related quality of life (HRQoL), causing them daily activity impairment, loss of work productivity and the need of using unscheduled doctor visits and hospital services3, 4. The direct and indirect costs in patients with a poor disease control represents an important proportion of the total cost of asthma, which it's estimated to be around 1-2% of the total public healthcare resources in developed countries, especially in patients with severe-persistent asthma4, 5.

The facts previously exposed turns this disease into a major public health problem due to its high prevalence within all age and sex groups and the high proportion of uncontrolled patients, which causes a high health burden to the National Health System, and which affects directly on the affected patients, as well as their families and the society6.

For this reason, during the past decades multiple clinical practice guidelines have been designed to improve the quality of care in patients with asthma and to reduce the high public burden associated to this disease7. International guidelines such as the Global Initiative for Asthma (GINA) and national guidelines as Guía Española para el Manejo del Asma (GEMA) in Spain, both of them stating that a good disease control can be achieved by most of asthma patients, were launched to increase the technical training of health professionals in order to reach a better disease management and conduct to a better quality of life in these patients 8, 9.

Specifically, GEMA guidelines also includes a tool to assess the level of assistance quality care through 8 indicators covering 4 dimensions: diagnose, non-pharmacological treatment, pharmacological treatment, monitoring.