330 Understanding of Asthma Terminology by Patients Interviewed in the Latin America Asthma Insight and Management (LA AIM) Survey

BACKGROUND: Patients often do not clearly understand the terminology regularly used by their physicians to describe asthma symptoms and their worsening, such as “attacks,” “exacerbations,” and “flare-ups”, among others. The Latin America Asthma Insight and Management (LA AIM) survey, a large and comprehensive asthma survey being conducted in 2011, explores differences across regions in the understanding of terminology to describe asthma symptoms, asthma deteriorations, and other asthma-related concepts. METHODS: Adult participants aged ≥18 years with asthma responded to survey questions during 35-minute face-to-face interviews. The survey was conducted in 4 Latin American countries (Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, and Venezuela) and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. A sample size of 2000 patients (400 patients/location) was determined to provide an accurate national representation of the opinions and views of asthma patients. The survey question on asthma terminology was designed to reveal respondents' familiarity with and understanding of asthma terms, such as “exacerbation,” “flare-up,” and “attack.” RESULTS: Results from the LA AIM survey will become available in November 2011. In the US AIM survey,1 conducted via telephone with 2500 respondents (adults, n = 2186, and parents of adolescent respondents), only 24% of asthma patients participating in the US survey were familiar with the term “asthma exacerbation.” In contrast, most asthma patients (97%) were familiar with the term “asthma attack,” and 71% of them recognized the term “asthma flare-up.” Perceptions of the meaning of “asthma flare-up” were less varied across groups. CONCLUSIONS: Distinctions exist in patients' understanding of asthma flare-ups and asthma attacks; however, asthma exacerbations, the phrase used most regularly by physicians, may not be well enough understood by asthma patients for effective communication with them. The LA AIM survey was designed to determine whether physicians and patients currently communicate in a mutually understood terminology.