The following is a summary of the “Standardization of Reporting Obstructive Airway Disease in Children: A National Delphi Process,” published in the January 2023 issue of Allergy and Clinical Immunology by Jong, et al.
The researchers aimed to get everyone in pediatric pulmonology to agree on standard diagnostic terms and features for describing obstructive airway disease in children. From 2017-2018, they collected data from 562 children in the Swiss Pediatric Airway Cohort. In addition, they analyzed the language used by pediatric pulmonologists in their letters of diagnosis to referring doctors.
Using qualitative thematic framework analysis, they classified these terms as either diagnostic labels (such as asthma) or features (such as triggers). The frequency of use of each term was also tallied. The Delphi method was reworked to incorporate the findings and agree on a standardized reporting format. They organized the 123 terms used by pediatric pulmonologists to describe the diagnosis into 6 diagnostic labels and 17 features.
The following suggestions were reached by consensus during the Delphi process: Use the term “asthma” for children over the age of 5, and “obstructive bronchitis” or “suspected asthma” for children under the age of 5; include relevant features such as diagnostic certainty, triggers, symptom control, risk of exacerbation, atopy, treatment adherence, and symptom perception with the diagnosis. Pediatric pulmonologists report occlusive airway disease in children in a highly variable fashion. The proposed standardized reporting will make it easier for doctors to share information and boost research quality using EHR data.
Source: sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2213219822009369
