Asthma deaths increasing for the over 70s
Australian deaths from asthma are on the rise with an additional 84 deaths in 2006 compared to 2005 with the biggest increase being in the over-70 age group with 273 deaths compared with 191 in 2005.
In a letter to the December issue of the Australasian Journal on Ageing, Vanessa McDonald and Peter Gibson of the University of Newcastle, say that “the rise in asthma mortality among older people is alarming since it shows that current management approaches may be ineffective when applied in an older generation.
“To explain the rise in asthma mortality among older people as a diagnostic labeling issue ie mislabelling a chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) misses the point. A person is just as dead whether their obstructive airway disease is labeled asthma or COPD, and recent data suggest that COPD is responsive to similar pharmacological and self-management interventions as are used in asthma”.
Ms McDonald and Mr Gibson suggest there is a “clear need for a new approach” which “must consider the coexistence of mixed airways diseases (asthma and COPD), multiple comorbidities, and multiple clinical problems. A problem-based strategy that identifies and treats the clinical and person-centred problems of older people using an interprofessional approach may lead to improved health outcomes and the same decline in mortality seen in younger Australians”.
