ASTHMA CONTROL DIARY (ACD)

Introduction

The Asthma Control Diary was developed at the same time as the Asthma Control Questionnaire (see above). It has almost the same symptom questions (woken at night by symptoms, waking in the morning with symptoms, activity limitation, shortness of breath and wheeze). It also asks about daily rescue bronchodilator use and includes daily peak expiratory flow measurement. Patients complete the diary on rising in the morning and retiring at bedtime.

Validity

Although it might be expected that a daily diary, completed by patients at home, would give more accurate results than a questionnaire completed in the clinic, the opposite was found in the validation study. Great care was taken to make sure that patients completed a full week of ACD measurements as accurately as possible. Nevertheless, the measurement properties and validity for the Asthma Control Questionnaire were still slightly better than those of the Asthma Control Diary. The ACD has strong measurement properties but there are minimal advantages over the ACQ and it is certainly more expensive, time consuming and prone to missing or falsified data than the ACQ.

Primary References

Juniper EF, O’Byrne PM, Ferrie PJ, King DR, Roberts JN. Measuring asthma control: clinic questionnaire or daily diary? Am J Respir Crit Care Med 2000; 162: 1330-1334.

Original language: English for North America

Formats: Paper: Self-administered

OTHER REFERENCES

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OBTAINING THE ACD


Asthma Control Questionnaire (ACQ) | Asthma Control Diary (ACD)