Quality of Life in Patients With Type 2 Inflammatory Asthma

Introduction

Asthma is a heterogeneous disease that often coexists with type 2 inflammatory (T2i) conditions in many individuals with severe asthma, leading to heightened exacerbations that diminish their quality of life (QoL). Despite this, there is a noticeable scarcity of QoL assessment tools specifically designed for individuals with T2i-related asthma.

Objectives

To analyse the asthma subset of T2i patients, derived from a survey conducted by the patient-driven T2i Network Project, aimed at identifying common drivers and challenges related to the QoL of T2i patients.

Material and methods

An anonymous online survey was distributed through eight Spanish patient associations. It comprised 29 questions about the patient's sociodemographic characteristics and several self-reported questions about the diagnosis, QoL measures, the severity of the disease, use of healthcare resources, and quality of care.

Results

The T2i asthma sub-analysis included 180 participants; 93% self-reported their disease severity as moderate-to-severe, 85% affected by one or more coexisting T2i diseases. An increase in the self-perceived severity was associated with higher self-perceived intensity, lack of control, and persistence of symptoms, with a stronger impact on total QoL. Asthma participants expressed a great impact on all the measured dimensions of the QoL.

Conclusions

The results demonstrate unmet needs and important difficulties for asthma T2i patients, either as the only condition or with other T2i conditions, and underscore the need for innovative approaches to improve their QoL. Most of this subset of patients perceive their condition as severe and experience self-perceived intense and limiting symptoms, which constantly worsen and persist over time.