Introduction

The major burden of managing patients with asthma is placed on primary care. The care offered by general practitioners and their practice nurses is based on their own knowledge and past experience coupled with guidelines on asthma management. With almost 55% of general practitioners using desktop computers during patient consultations, the provision of computerised guidelines would seem to be a logical avenue of exploration. In addition, if the computer system accessed only those guidelines relevant to a patient's current condition, the clinician would be able to complete the consultation without a lengthy search for the correct recommendations.

Method

A user friendly computer program to aid general practitioners and practice nurses in the treatment of patients with asthma was produced. The program based recommendations on the patients current condition measured against the British Thoracic society Treatment Guidelines for Asthma Management. The program has three main functions:

• Helping a general practitioner to manage an acute asthma attack by issuing step-by-step instructions based on the British Thoracic Society Guidelines.

• Recommending future treatment and management based on data collected at a routine asthma consultation.

• Predicting the future morbidity of the patient by analysing similar case histories held in an integral database to the program.

The program will produce a printed treatment plan agreed upon by the patient and general practitioner at the end of any consultation for the medical notes and also for the patient to take away.

Conclusion

We have found the program not only user friendly, unobtrusive and its advice relevant to good clinical practice, it is something general practitioners and practice nurses can and will want to use.

Acknowledgements

The project team would like to thank all the staff and patients at the general practices in Tayside who kindly agreed to take part in this research project, along with the committee members of the General Practitioners in Asthma Group who gave expert advice and guidance throughout. The project was funded by the Scottish Home and Health Department, Scottish Office UK and General Practitioners in Asthma Group UK.