Prevailing Practices for the Management of Dry Cough in India: A Questionnaire Based Survey

The aim of the survey was to understand the prevailing practice pattern for the management of dry cough among primary care physicians in Indian clinical setting.

This single visit, cross-sectional, non-interventional, interview based physician survey was conducted over a period of 3 months where 500 registered physicians with at least 6 months of clinical practice and willing to participate in the survey were interviewed in their clinic or hospital from June to August 2015. They were asked to complete a structured questionnaire, consisting of 28 questions, regarding their routine clinical practice ranging from patient demographics to etiology to treatment modalities for management of dry cough.

Approximately 40% physicians reported that 11-20% of their patients had dry cough predominantly. 57% and 46% physicians reported acute and chronic dry cough in >30% of their patients, respectively. 68% physicians reported that > 21% of their patients with chronic dry cough were smokers and 61-62% physicians reported that 11-30% of their patients had exposure to pollution. As per physicians, 19.6% of their patients had allergy/asthma followed by respiratory tract infections (17.6% patients), smokers cough (11.4%) and gastroesophageal reflux disease (10.4%). 86.4% physicians recommended that the underlying cause of chronic dry cough should be determined prior to initiating the specific therapy and 13.6% recommended that cough should be suppressed to improve quality of life of the patients. Dextromethorphan (ranked 1 by 68% physicians) and codeine (ranked 2 by 47% physicians) were the most recommended antitussives in patients with dry cough.

Dry cough causes the significant impairment in patient's daily associated activities. An increased awareness of treatment patterns for the management of dry cough among physicians could significantly improve patient's quality of life.