Cough affects quality of life in asthmatic children aged 8-14 more than other asthma symptoms.
BACKGROUND
Asthma may influence children's health-related quality of life (QoL) differently by various symptoms, at different severity. The primary aim of this study was to evaluate the QoL in children with asthma and describe the impact of each asthma symptom on the child's well-being at different severity levels.


METHODS
Two hundred randomly selected children and one of their parents who consulted an outpatient asthma clinic, participated in the study. Qol was assessed with DISABKIDS-Smiley measure for children aged 4-7 years and with DISABKIDS DCGM-37 and Asthma Module for children 8-14 year old.


RESULTS
Most of the children suffered from mild or moderate persistent asthma. Children with uncontrolled asthma stated lower QoL compared to partly controlled or controlled in both age groups (p < 0.05 in all domains). Cough appeared to affect QoL of 8-14 year olds more than other symptoms, especially in girls. In younger children, sex (boys, p = 0.039), age (p = 0.045), proxy sex (father, p = 0.048), frequency of doctor visits (4-6 months, p = 0.001), use of beta-2 agonists (p = 0.007) and father's smoking habits (p = 0.015) were associated with the QoL of coughing children but no correlation between cough and QoL was detected. In the 8-14 year age group coughers reported lower QoL compared to their counterparts; moreover, cough was found to affect QoL more than other symptoms (p < 0.05 in all domains).


CONCLUSIONS
Cough has a direct effect on asthmatic children's QoL but there is still an obvious need for research to reveal all the determinats of this effect.
Petsios
Konstantinos Th
KT
Faculty of Nursing, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece. cpetsios@nurs.uoa.gr
Priftis
Kostas N
KN
Tsoumakas
Constantinos
C
Perperoglou
Aris
A
Hatziagorou
Elpida
E
Tsanakas
John N
JN
Androulakis
Ioannis
I
Matziou
Vasiliki N
VN
D000293:Adolescent; D001249:Asthma / Q000150:complications* / Q000276:immunology / Q000503:physiopathology*; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003371:Cough / Q000209:etiology* / Q000503:physiopathology*; D004417:Dyspnea / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D016014:Linear Models; D008297:Male; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D011788:Quality of Life; D012135:Respiratory Sounds / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires