چکیده (انگلیسی):

Background:Asthma is often poorly controlled and guidelines are often inadequately followed in medical practice.
In particular, the prescription of non-asthma-specific drugs can affect the quality of care. The goal of this study was
to measure the frequency of the prescription of antibiotics and anxiolytics/hypnotics to asthmatic patients and to
look for associations between sex or age and the prescription of these drugs.
Methods:A cross-sectional study was conducted using computerised medical records from French and Italian
general practitioners’ networks. Patients were selected according to criteria adapted from the HEDIS (Healthcare
Effectiveness Data and Information Set) criteria. The outcome measure was the number of antibiotics or
anxiolytics/hypnotics prescriptions per patient in 1 year. Parallel multivariate models were developed.
Results:The final sample included 3,093 French patients (mean age 27.6 years, 49.7% women) and 3,872 Italian
patients (mean age 29.1 years, 48.7% women). In the univariate analysis, the French patients were prescribed fewer
antibiotics than the Italian patients (37.1% vs. 42.2%, p < 0.00001) but more anxiolytics/hypnotics (17.8% vs. 6.9%,
p < 0.0001). In the multivariate models, the female patients were more likely to receive antibiotics (odds ratio:
1.5 [1.3–1.7]) and anxiolytics/hypnotics (odds ratio: 1.8 [1.5–2.1]).
Conclusions:The prescription of antibiotics and anxiolytics/hypnotics to asthmatic patients is frequent, especially in
women. Asthma guidelines should address this issue by referring to other guidelines covering the prescription of
non-asthma-specific drugs, and alternative non-pharmacological interventions should be considered.