Adherence to treatment and monitoring tools: what's new?

Asthma is a serious global health problem affecting all age groups, with global prevalence. Although controller medications are usually highly-effective asthma treatments, patient adherence remains poor, and under-use is associated with greater health resource use, morbidity, and mortality. Up to 70-80% of patients cannot use their inhaler correctly, and similar proportions of health professionals are unable to demonstrate its correct use. A recent paper by Foster et al. explored the effectiveness of two briefs GPs' delivered intervention in improving adherence to asthma treatment and diseases control in patients with uncontrolled moderate/severe persistent asthma, in real-community setting. The results suggested that inhaler reminders may represent an effective strategy for improving adherence in primary care compared with a behavioral intervention or usual care, although this may not be reflected in differences in levels of asthma control. Studies in larger population are needed in order to test the efficacy of available technology on asthma outcomes in all age stages.