Airway Obstruction in Primary Care Patients: Need for Implementing Spirometry Use

Abstract

(1) Background: To detect early airway obstruction in an adult primary care setting. (2) Methods: Seventeen general practitioners (GP) were involved. A total of 912 patients consulting their GPs over 40 years were recruited: 583 of them (323M) agreed to perform/undergo all the procedures: respiratory questionnaire, mMRC questionnaire, and spirometry. We identified four subgroups: physician COPD patients; physician asthma patients; asthma-COPD overlap syndrome patients; and no respiratory diagnosis subjects, on the basis of physician diagnosis. For screening purposes, an FEV1/FVC p p = 0.01), older age (p p = 0.002) were the best predictors of airway obstruction. (4) Conclusions: A high prevalence of AO was found. In AO we found a high prevalence of subjects without respiratory symptoms or respiratory chronic diagnosis. Airway obstruction was predicted by the presence of wheezing, sputum, older age, and male gender.

Keywords

• airway obstruction
• primary care
• spirometry