Efficacy of treatment in the Asthma Clinic of Banglamung Hospital.

Abstract

Objective : The purpose of this quasi-experimental study was to evaluate the effi cacy of the Banglamung Hospital’s asthma clinic by comparing the results of the care before and after attending the clinic in 92 selected patients in the period from January 1 to December 31, 2009. The research instrumenst were history and symptoms record forms and the Thai version of Asthma Quality of Life Questionnaire (AQLQ). Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and tests for signifi cant differences.

Results : The result showed that the hospitalization rate of asthma cases was reduced from 36.95 to 10.86 percent, the rate of patients receiving nebulizers in the emergency room was reduced from 68.47 to 33.69 percent, the use of short-acting beta2- agonist was reduced from 61.95 to 38.04 percent and the control of the disease increased from 4.34 to 26.08 percent. The mean of in-patient admission, visiting the emergency room, use of short-acting beta2- agonist, peak expiratory fl ow and quality of life of the experimental group was signifi cantly different at the 0.05 level.

Conclusion : This overall result implies that asthma can be controlled by providing, in addition to the use of appropriate drugs (ICs), appropriate education about the disease and an understanding of how asthma treatment work. Finally,the quality of life was better, and the necessity of emergency room visits and hospitalization was much reduced.

Keyword : Effi cacy of Treatment Asthma Clinic