Abstract

CRUZ, Cíntia et al. CARATkids questionnaire and spirometry in the assessment of asthma control. Rev Port Imunoalergologia [online]. 2017, vol.25, n.2, pp.115-125. ISSN 0871-9721.

Background: The use of standardised questionnaires and lung function measurements are essential in the assessment of patients with asthma and/or rhinitis symptoms. CARATkids is the first questionnaire to simultaneously assess the control of asthma and allergic rhinitis (AAR) in children. Objectives: To evaluate the degree of clinical control of AAR in children using the clinical scores obtained by applying CARATkids; To study the correlation between the clinical scores and the spirometric parameters. Methods: Prospective study including 109 children aged 6 to 12 years-old, with AAR, referred to our Hospital’s Immunoallergy Department, which consisted in filling out the CARATkids questionnaire during a lung function test. We considered the total score obtained and, separately, the questions answered positively by the parents (adult score) and by the children (child score); within the latter, we assigned a separate classification to the upper airway (VAS score) and lower airway (VAI score) questions. The level of AAR control is inversely proportional to the obtained scores. We considered two age groups (6-9 and 10-12 years) and calculated the degree of correlation between the spirometric parameters and the values of the several scores. Results: We found a high frequency of symptoms and and relevant impact of the disease on the children’s daily activities. We found in younger children a negative correlation between the child, adult and total scores with %FEV1, which did not happen in children aged 10-12 years. Conclusions: The CARATkids results suggest that AAR was insufficiently controlled in most of the children in our sample, highlighting the importance of using a standardized questionnaire in their evaluation. The low correlation demonstrated in younger children between some of the considered scores and %FEV1 values suggest that the two study methods assess different asthma aspects, and should be used in a complementary way

Keywords : Asthma; CARATkids; control; questionnaire; rhinitis; spirometry.

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