Patient perception of symptoms in severe asthma

  • Research type

    Research Study

  • Full title

    PATIENT PERCEPTION OF SYMPTOMS IN SEVERE ASTHMA

  • IRAS ID

    245411

  • Contact name

    Liam Heaney

  • Contact email

    l.heaney@qub.ac.uk

  • Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier

    N/A, N/A

  • Duration of Study in the UK

    1 years, 0 months, 0 days

  • Research summary

    Patients with asthma are troubled with a variety of symptoms which, when poorly controlled, tend to drive treatment escalation. A sizeable proportion of asthmatics do not meet an acceptable level of disease control despite being prescribed high-dose anti-inflammatory and bronchodilator therapy and are regarded as “difficult-to-treat” or “severe” asthmatics. These symptoms can have a significant impact on quality of life in asthmatics and even more so in those with poor disease control, making it a vital consideration when managing the disease. However, many currently used measurement tools in asthma fail to provide adequate levels of psychometric data or give an accurate score relating to quality of life. Rather, the focus is on measures of asthma control in relation to symptoms and/or functional status.

    In this study, we plan to conduct a conjoint analysis study in severe asthmatic patients using a similar methodology used by Osman et al (2001). In the original study, patients with moderate asthma were given a number of scenario pairs and asked to choose which they would prefer based on different attributes for 5 common asthma symptoms.This included daytime cough, daytime breathlessness, daytime wheeze, daytime chest tightness and sleep disturbance as a result of nighttime asthma symptoms. Each pair of scenarios consists of a "Week A" and a "Week B" which each describe what most days of the week would be like in relation to each of the 5 common symptoms listed. Patients were asked to indicate which they would prefer, essentially trading of symptoms in favour of others.

    We hope to recreate this study in a well-defined severe asthmatic population in a clinical setting. We also plan to compare patient weighting of symptoms with an asthma control questionnaire (ACQ) score along with other established markers of asthma control.

  • REC name

    London - Hampstead Research Ethics Committee

  • REC reference

    19/LO/0171

  • Date of REC Opinion

    23 Jan 2019

  • REC opinion

    Further Information Favourable Opinion