A milti-centre study of the prevalence of allergic rhinitis and its associated morbidity among adults with asthma

Abstract

BACKGROUND/PURPOSE: Allergic rhinitis (AR) is a common co-morbid condition of asthma. This study aimed to assess the prevalence of AR in adult patients with asthma in Hong Kong. In addition, the morbidity of patients with asthma and concomitant AR was compared against asthma patients without AR. METHODS: A cross-sectional study of 600 adults with asthma recruited from the respiratory clinics of four major public hospitals. Doctors and patients completed separate questionnaires evaluating symptoms, treatment and health care utilization. Spirometry data were obtained for a subgroup of patients at the time of survey completion. RESULTS: Altogether 267 males and 333 females were recruited; 251 with spirometry data. The mean pre-bronchodilator FEV1 % predicted among those who had spirometry performed was 87.9 (SD28.1) %. Of the 600 subjects, 49.5 and 50.5% had intermittent and persistent asthma respectively, while 463 (77.2%) had AR symptoms in the past 12 months, vast majority (96%) of whom had a previous diagnosis of AR. Asthmatics without AR symptoms had higher rates of visits to doctors, pharmacy visits, emergency department attendances and hospitalizations for asthma than those with asthma and AR. Among subjects with asthma and AR, those taking nasal steroid (226 out of 463 subjects [48.8%]) had lower rates of emergency department visits (13.3 vs 24.5%, p = 0.002) and hospitalizations (7.1 vs 12.7%, p = 0.045) for asthma than those who were not. CONCLUSIONS: AR is a common co-morbid condition of asthma in this hospital clinic cohort with 77.2% of the asthma subjects having AR symptoms in the past 12 months.