Symptom Burden of COPD in Humanitarian Settings

Clinical Research Results Abstract Abstract Title: Symptom Burden of COPD in Humanitarian Settings Introduction: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) imposes a substantial symptom burden and affects quality of life of patients.1-3 Moreover, COPD is projected to be the third most common cause of global mortality by 2030. The research evidence is from high-income and non-humanitarian contexts. This study was undertaken to learn about symptom burden of COPD patients in humanitarian settings where an estimated 2 billion people live.4 We aimed to determine the symptom burden by documenting self-perceived symptom severity of COPD patients. Methods: We designed a prospective multicenter cross-sectional observational study to investigate COPD patients in 10 primary healthcare centres in Rohingya refugee camps, Cox’s Bazar between March 1, 2020 and August 31, 2020. We used modified Edmonton Symptom Assessment System to assess prevalence, frequency and severity of symptoms. A multiple linear regression was used to develop a model for identifying variables associated with symptom burden. All analyses were carried out using IBM SPSS Statistics 25.0 for Mac OS (Chicago, USA). Results: A total of 774 patients’ with chronic respiratory diseases data revealed: mean age 57.7 (SD ±13.9) years, 53.1% males, 74.2% Rohingya, 87.2% married and 78.7% had COPD. The overall model was statistically significant and explained approximately 85.5% of the variance in symptom burden. Four independent variables (depression, fatigue, insomnia and pain) correlated substantially with the total symptom burden score (.70, .60, .58 and .57 respectively). Depression was the most prevalent symptom (β-49.4), and cough was the least ((β-17.1). >30% of patients reported fatigue (β-31.6). Other significant predictors were pain (β-25.6) and insomnia (β-22.7). Discussion: This study proved that COPD in common in humanitarian settings with a high symptom burden. Regular symptom documentation with a valid tool may increase clinician’s attention to early recognition and diagnosis of COPD for palliation. Research Idea Abstract Service Development & Evaluation Abstract Declaration of Interest No competing interests References and Clinical Trial Registry Information References: 1. http://www.goldcopd.org. 2. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12931-017-0548-3 3. doi: 10.7189/jogh.05-020415. 4. https://gho.unocha.org/