Clinical presentation of asthma is variable, and its diagnosis can be a major challenge in routine health-care practice, especially in low-and-middle-income countries. The aim of asthma management is to achieve optimal asthma control and to reduce the risk of asthma exacerbations and mortality. In the Middle East and in Africa (MEA), several patient- and physician-related factors lead to misdiagnosis and suboptimal management of asthma. A panel of experts comprising of specialists as well as general health-care professionals met to identify challenges and provide recommendations for the management of asthma in MEA. The major challenges identified for diagnosis of asthma were lack of adequate knowledge about the disease, lack of specialized diagnostic facilities, limited access to spirometry, and social stigma associated with asthma. The prime challenges for management of asthma in MEA were identified as overreliance on short-acting β-agonists (SABAs), underprescription of inhaled corticosteroids (ICS), nonadherence to prescribed medications, and inadequate insurance coverage for its treatment. The experts endorsed adapting the Global Initiative for Asthma guidelines at country and regional levels for effective management of asthma and to alleviate the overuse of SABAs as reliever medications. Stringent control over SABA use, discouraging over-the-counter availability of SABA, and using as-needed low-dose ICS and formoterol as rescue medications in mild cases were suggested to reduce the overreliance on SABAs. Encouraging SABA alone-free clinical practice in both outpatient and emergency department settings is also imperative. We present the recommendations for the management of asthma along with proposed regional adaptations of international guidelines for MEA.
The prevalence and incidence of asthma are increasing globally because of genetic and environmental influences. Prevalence of asthma in the Gulf has been reported to range from 4.7% to 32.0% and has a substantial economic burden. In this paper, we summarize current asthma management guidance for adults, present insights, and recommendations by key opinion leaders (KOLs) in the Gulf region, and key performance indicators for guiding clinical practice for asthma diagnosis, management, and treatment in the Gulf. While it is recommended that the Global Initiative for Asthma (GINA) guidelines should be followed wherever possible for the management of asthma, KOLs in the Gulf region have presented additional recommendations based on regional challenges and insights. There is a need for better diagnosis using objective testing, increased efforts in tackling the burden of comorbidities in the region, and greater provision of the necessary tools for phenotyping severe asthma. Furthermore, there is a need for greater education for physicians regarding asthma treatment, including the importance of inhaled-corticosteroid-containing controller medication. Regionally, there is also a need for specialist asthma clinics and asthma educators, which would serve to educate physicians and their patients as well as to improve the management of patients. Finally, the use of asthma registries, digital devices, and electronic templates would be of benefit in the management of asthma patients in the region.
Asthma, rhinitis, and atopic dermatitis (AD) are interrelated clinical phenotypes that partly overlap in the human interactome. The concept of "one-airway-one-disease," coined over 20 years ago, is a simplistic approach of the links between upper- and lower-airway allergic diseases. With new data, it is time to reassess the concept. This article reviews (i) the clinical observations that led to Allergic Rhinitis and its Impact on Asthma (ARIA), (ii) new insights into polysensitization and multimorbidity, (iii) advances in mHealth for novel phenotype definitions, (iv) confirmation in canonical epidemiologic studies, (v) genomic findings, (vi) treatment approaches, and (vii) novel concepts on the onset of rhinitis and multimorbidity. One recent concept, bringing together upper- and lower-airway allergic diseases with skin, gut, and neuropsychiatric multimorbidities, is the "Epithelial Barrier Hypothesis." This review determined that the "one-airway-one-disease" concept does not always hold true and that several phenotypes of disease can be defined. These phenotypes include an extreme "allergic" (asthma) phenotype combining asthma, rhinitis, and conjunctivitis. Rhinitis alone and rhinitis and asthma multimorbidity represent two distinct diseases with the following differences: (i) genomic and transcriptomic background (Toll-Like Receptors and IL-17 for rhinitis alone as a local disease; IL-33 and IL-5 for allergic and non-allergic multimorbidity as a systemic disease), (ii) allergen sensitization patterns (mono- or pauci-sensitization versus polysensitization), (iii) severity of symptoms, and (iv) treatment response. In conclusion, rhinitis alone (local disease) and rhinitis with asthma multimorbidity (systemic disease) should be considered as two distinct diseases, possibly modulated by the microbiome, and may be a model for understanding the epidemics of chronic and autoimmune diseases.
The traditional healthcare model is focused on diseases (medicine and natural science) and does not acknowledge patients' resources and abilities to be experts in their own life based on their lived experiences. Improving healthcare safety, quality and coordination, as well as quality of life, are important aims in the care of patients with chronic conditions. Person-centred care needs to ensure that people's values and preferences guide clinical decisions. This paper reviews current knowledge to develop (i) digital care pathways for rhinitis and asthma multimorbidity and (ii) digitally-enabled person-centred care (1). It combines all relevant research evidence, including the so-called real-world evidence, with the ultimate goal to develop digitally-enabled, patient-centred care. The paper includes (i) Allergic Rhinitis and its Impact on Asthma (ARIA), a two-decade journey, (ii) Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE), the evidence-based model of guidelines in airway diseases, (iii) mHealth impact on airway diseases, (iv) from guidelines to digital care pathways, (v) embedding Planetary Health, (vi) novel classification of rhinitis and asthma, (vi) embedding real-life data with population-based studies, (vii) the ARIA-EAACI strategy for the management of airway diseases using digital biomarkers, (viii) Artificial Intelligence, (ix) the development of digitally-enabled ARIA Person-Centred Care and (x) the political agenda. The ultimate goal is to propose ARIA 2024 guidelines centred around the patient in order to make them more applicable and sustainable.