What GPs know about asthma

Whilst Dr McCartney rightly points out the flawed methodology of the
survey of general practioners' knowledge of asthma guidelines,[1] asthma
care often remains suboptimal in both primary and secondary care. For
example, the 2009 British Thoracic Society National Adult Asthma Audit
found that less than half of patients admitted with acute asthma had their
inhaler technique prior to discharge.[2] Of those who did, almost half
needed revision of their technique. Whilst knowledge of guidelines is
important, they are meaningless if their guidance is not followed. At our
institution, all inpatient inhaler technique checks had been performed by
Respiratory nurses. We made simple alterations to the Respiratory nurse
referral system to increase the proportion of patients seen by the
Respiratory nurses during admission, which subsequently increased the
percentage of patients who had their inhaler technique checked to over
90%.

[1] McCartney M. What GPs know about asthma. BMJ 2011;342:d2972
[2] Higgins B. British Thoracic Society 2009 Adult Asthma Audit.
http://www.brit-
thoracic.org.uk/Portals/0/Audit%20Tools/AdultAsthmaOverview.pdf