General practitioners' management of childhood asthma in Sfax, Tunisia

Aims - To study primary care physicians' attitudes toward childhood asthma management andtheir adherence to international guidelines. Methods. - Cross-sectional, descriptive and analytical survey conducted among 400 primarycare physicians practicing in the governorate of Sfax. Data collection was done through a selfadministered questionnaire with 36 questions. Results. - the participation rate was 53.75%. The average age was 49.72 years and the sexratio = 1.52. 56.3% reported that they assisted in childhood asthma medical education between2019 and 2020. Poor knowledge was found in 53.3% of practitioners. It concerns in 60.5% ofcases the long-term asthma treatment. We found that 49.8% of doctors did not use the GINAguidelines in their daily practice. These guidelines were considered too complex by 45.8%. Oral salbutamol was prescribed by 10.2% of physicians in childhood asthma exacerbation and 64.2% antibiotics as therapy for childhood febrile asthma exacerbation. The practice of prescribingantihistamines as long-term therapy is still present in 28.8% of physicians. In front of exercise-induced asthma, sports exemptions were given by 33% of participants. Adherence to asthmaguidelines was found in 34,41%. Physicians who are aged between 35 and 45 years and who usedGINA guidelines had better childhood asthma management score than other physicians. Conclusion. - Despite guidelines, childhood asthma is still underdiagnosis and undertreated. Our study revealed difficulties faced by primary care physicians in the management of childhoodasthma. (c) 2022 SPLF. Published by Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.