Effectiveness of Asthma Home Management Manual and Low-Cost Air Filter on Quality of Life Among Asthma Adults: A 3-Arm Randomized Controlled Trial.

Background: Asthma affects the quality of life (QoL) of millions of people worldwide. Effective control is paramount to a decline in prevalence and severity. To address this, we aimed to investigate the effectiveness of an asthma home management manual and low-cost air filter in improving resource-limited settings.

Patients And Methods: This randomized controlled trial was conducted between March to July 2022. The participants were 18-55 years old outpatient with asthmatic patients. A total of 114 participants were recruited and randomly assigned to three groups: home management only, home management and air filtering, and control. Validated measurement tools were applied, and the Wilcoxon test was used to evaluate changes in QoL.

Results: Asthma burden was found in at least one-third of participants in each group. At baseline, there was no difference in mAQLQ scores among participants in all group allocations (-value > 0.05), and the air filter group had an increase in the total mAQLQ score (-value = 0.044) and post-intervention activity quality of life (-value = 0.002). The environmental quality of life increased post-intervention (-value = 0.004) and remained higher after four weeks of follow-up compared to baseline (-value = 0.041) in the home management group participants.

Conclusion: The findings indicate that the enforcement of a home management manual and the application of low-cost filters in air circulation systems offer advantages in improving the quality of life of patients with moderate and mild asthma.