Evaluation of severity of acute asthma in emergency department setting

Setting : Accident & Emergency Department (A & E), Hamad General Hospital. Objective : To define the most practical and easiest way of evaluating the severity of an acute asthmatic attack. Design : Prospective study, investigated the relationship between clinical evaluation using respiratory rate as a guide for severity compared to Peak Expiratory flow rate (PEFR) using portable Peak expiratory flow meters, oxygen saturation using pulse oximetry, and arterial blood gas analysis at the time of presentation to Emergency Dept. (ED. Data were gathered before and after treatment and analyzed using SPSS package for data analysis. Result : Total number of patients was 91, 33 female and 58 male, mean age 44-35 years (range 17-95). Seventy four cases were severe and 17 moderate, there was significant relation between severity and pulse rate (P < 0.019), between severity and Conclusion : Rating of dyspnea using an accurate respiratory rate together with pulse rate and oxygen saturation via pulse oximetry provides an easy and valuable method of assessing the severity of an asthmatic attack.