[Consistency of clinical practice with the scientific evidence in the management of childhood asthma].
BACKGROUND
There is substantial inconsistency between the evidence available on the management of childhood asthma and its application in practice.


OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the degree of appropriateness of current management of childhood asthma.


METHODS
We performed a structured review of the articles published on appropriateness in the recent biomedical literature (last 5 years). Methodological analysis and qualitative synthesis were performed.


RESULTS
Twenty-three articles were identified that reflected the following problems: insufficient documentation on trigger factors, evolution of pulmonary function and symptoms, inadequate guidelines on the treatment of exacerbations, inadequate use of inhaler devices, insufficient use of anti-inflammatory drugs, unjustified heterogeneity in the selection of anti-inflammatory drugs, lack of correlation between severity and level of treatment, lack of written guidelines on customized self-management, unjustified use of antibiotics, and lack of pulmonary function testing devices.


CONCLUSIONS
The management of childhood asthma should be reviewed since a large number of decisions made in clinical practice are not always based on valid scientific evidence.
Ochoa Sangrador
C
C
Servicios de Pediatría, Hospital Virgen de la Concha, Zamora, Spain. cochoas@meditex.es
González de Dios
J
J
D000293:Adolescent; D001249:Asthma / Q000628:therapy*; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D019468:Disease Management; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D010043:Outcome and Process Assessment, Health Care; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D010818:Practice Patterns, Physicians'