DISCUSSION

Asthma has been chosen in this study because of its impact on quality of life. This study identified various medication related problems. They include overuse of bronchodilators (reliever), under-use of corticosteroids (preventer), poor inhaler technique and poor understanding of the benefit and use of peak flow meter. Structured and focused processes have enabled the pharmacists to realize improvements in daily performance of most patients. This change observed at final visit and evidenced by mean scores. The majority of the intervention group patients reported significantly fewer asthma symptoms, fewer numbers of puffs of rescue medication, and fewer numbers of asthma attacks, reduced asthma severity and better performance of daily activities. Risk of non-adherence decreased among intervention group patients. All the four domains of AQLQ indicated extremely statistically significant improvements in the intervention group while the control group patients did not show any significant improvement over the course of the study. The study conducted by Bandana Saini, et al9 in the year 2004, reported improvement in peak expiratory flow values in the intervention group from 82.7% ±8.2 at baseline to 87.4% ±8.9 at the final visit whereas in our study, the PEFR improved from 268.75 ±81.27 L/Min at baseline to 299.5 ±84.37 L/Min at the final interview. A similar study conducted by Marabini .A, et al10 also demonstrated improvement in all domains of AQLQ in the intervention group. The patient’s understanding of the importance of treatment influenced compliance more positively, which reflects the importance of communication with the patient.

CONCLUSION

Pharmacists are in unique position to monitor and counsel patients with asthma. Results from the study provide evidence that through providing structured, patient-oriented pharmaceutical care, pharmacists can help asthma patients achieve desired health outcome. The study has demonstrated a positive impact on improving patients’ asthma-related quality of life, lung function, reducing asthma symptoms, asthma severity, number of asthma attacks and use of rescue medications. P values between the study groups for all the tests performed were ≤ 0.0001 which is statistically significant and evident that difference has been observed between the intervention group and control group.