Asthma control in the Portuguese National Asthma Survey

Introduction: we aimed (1) to measure asthma control using a structure-questionnaire and patient self-perception of asthma-control in the portuguese national asthma survey (inasma) and (2) to study the relationship between asthma control and asthma-related quality of life. methods: we analyze data of asthma patients from a cross-sectional,nationwide telephone interview study - inasma. controlled asthma was defined as carat global score >24 or carat lower airways score ≥16. mini-aqlq was used to measure quality of life. results: two hundred and seven (56.9% [95%ci: 51.8-62.0]) of the 364 patients had controlled asthma. most patients with non-controlled asthma (88%) perceived their disease as controlled. patients with controlled asthma presented higher mini-aqlq scores (median,p25-p75; 6.6,6.0-6.9) than those with non-controlled asthma (4.9,3.7-5.7) (p < 0.001) and a significant positive correlation between carat and mini-aqlq scores was observed (r = 0.706; p < 0.001). conclusion: more than half of the portuguese patients presented controlled asthma and showed significantly better asthma-related quality of life. almost 9 out of 10 patients with non-controlled disease have poor perception of their asthma control,which may hinder them from seeking better asthma control. © 2014 sociedade portuguesa de pneumologia.