Asthma affects over 25 million people in the United States.1 It can cause repeated episodes of wheezing, breathlessness, chest tightness and coughing,2 and if not managed properly, can result in frequent visits to the emergency department (ED), as well as hospitalizations and death. In 2019, 1.8 million people visited the ED for asthma treatment and almost 170,000 were hospitalized.1
This poses a considerable issue for patients and providers alike, as identification of patients with asthma who are at risk for exacerbations could have an effect when it comes to optimal management options. There is a unique need for a resource to predict risk of future exacerbations in patients.
Predicting future risk of asthma exacerbations with AIRQ®
One key to optimizing asthma management is measuring how well a patient’s asthma is controlled and then tailoring a strategy to meet the patient’s needs.3 The validated Asthma Impairment and Risk Questionnaire (AIRQ®), developed to help identify patients ≥12 years of age whose health may be at risk because of uncontrolled asthma, can play an important role in measuring each patient’s asthma control. The AIRQ® is not intended to diagnose asthma, replace the advice or treatment of a health care provider or direct specific actions to treat, mitigate, or improve asthma.
AIRQ® was developed with the input from over 200 health care professionals and has been cross-sectionally and longitudinally validated against objective measures for more than 1,100 asthma patients at least 12 years of age with a previous diagnosis of asthma. The cross-sectional validation metric for the AIRQ® was the combination standard of the Asthma Control Test™ (ACT) score (impairment) + prior-year, chart-documented exacerbations (risk) in 442 of patients.4,5
Engaging patients with 10 brief questions
Brief enough for patients to complete at their convenience, AIRQ® is a free tool available in both English and Spanish, at airqscore.com. It consists of 7 yes/no questions assessing impairment over the previous 2 weeks and 3 exacerbation-risk questions relative to the prior year. Questions cover topics such as a patient’s ability to exercise and take part in social activities, symptom interference with daily life, asthma medications, and utilization of health care resources.
AIRQ® scores are intended to be discussed with a health care provider and to facilitate asthma management plan development. The effectiveness of the plan can be evaluated using the Follow-Up AIRQ® that measures the same parameters as the AIRQ®, but the lookback period for the exacerbation-risk questions relate to the last 3 months (instead of 12 months). The Follow-Up AIRQ® helps asthma patients and health care providers understand the patient’s asthma control over time, and contribute to educational and therapeutic interventions.4,5
Health care providers can find information on the site pertaining to asthma phenotypes and endotypes, US guidelines for asthma treatment, comorbidities associated with asthma and more useful resources. For patients, resources include information about spirometry testing, airway inflammation and inhaler use.
A new tool for people with asthma
AIRQ® helps patients understand if they might be at risk for exacerbations and reinforces the importance of working with their health care provider to develop and optimize a treatment plan that best fits their own needs.
This is sponsored content by AstraZeneca and neither the Editorial Advisory Board of CHEST Physician nor the publication’s reporting or editing staff contributed to this content.
US-72980 Last Updated 2/23
References
1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Most Recent National Asthma Data. https://www.cdc.gov/asthma/most_recent_national_asthma_data.htm. Accessed January 31, 2023.
2. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Asthma. https://www.cdc.gov/asthma/. Accessed January 31, 2023.
3. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Asthma: Management and Treatment. https://www.cdc.gov/asthma/management.html. Accessed January 31, 2023.
4. AIRQ®. The Asthma Resource Center. https://www.asthmaresourcecenter.com. Published March 22, 2022. Accessed January 31, 2023.
5. Beuther DA, Murphy KR, Zeiger RS, et al. The asthma impairment and risk questionnaire (AIRQ) control level predicts future risk of asthma exacerbations. J Allergy Clin Immunol Pract. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2213219822008224. Published August 23, 2022. Accessed January 31, 2023.