TY - JOUR T1 - Rapid reduction in hospitalisations after an intervention to manage severe asthma JF - European Respiratory Journal JO - Eur Respir J SP - 515 LP - 521 DO - 10.1183/09031936.00101009 VL - 35 IS - 3 AU - C. Souza-Machado AU - A. Souza-Machado AU - R. Franco AU - E. V. Ponte AU - M. L. Barreto AU - L. C. Rodrigues AU - J. Bousquet AU - A. A. Cruz Y1 - 2010/03/01 UR - http://erj.ersjournals.com/content/35/3/515.abstract N2 - Asthma is the third cause of hospitalisations due to clinical illnesses in Brazil. The Programme for Control of Asthma in Bahia (ProAR) leads an initiative in Salvador City (Brazil) to manage severe asthma for free. The aim of this study was to identify trends in asthma hospitalisation in the entire city and to evaluate the impact of ProAR. Information on asthma hospitalisations from 1998 to 2006 was collected. We analysed trends in Salvador (2.8 million inhabitants) before and after ProAR, taking pneumonia and myocardial infarction into account for local comparison. As an external control we obtained information on asthma from Recife, which is the most comparable Brazilian city. In Salvador, asthma hospital admissions declined by 82.3% (1998–2006). A greater proportion of this reduction (74%) occurred after 2003, in parallel with the implementation of ProAR. The reduction in asthma admissions in Recife was smaller. The rates of hospitalisation in 2006 were 2.25 per 10,000 inhabitants in Salvador and 17.06 in Recife. In Salvador, we found an inverse correlation between the provision of medication for asthma and hospitalisation (-0.801; p<0.0001). A rapid reduction in asthma admissions in the entire city of Salvador was associated with ProAR, a public health intervention targeting severe asthma. ER -