The impact of asthma in an inner city general practice.

The article focuses on a study that was undertaken to find out the problems which children with asthma experience at school and at home. Patient interviews with 32 asthmatic children aged between 6 and 16 years using a semi-structured questionnaire were carried out in an inner city practice in Bristol. Twenty-three children experienced exercise-induced bronchospasm which particularly upset them at school. Eleven of 14 secondary schoolchildren said that not being able to participate in sport was the worst thing about having asthma. Every child in the study admitted to some aspect of home or school life being affected by having asthma. Apart from one primary school child, they viewed these issues negatively. The most striking aspect of this small study was the degree to which exercise induced asthma adversely affected children in the practice.