Prevalence of Asthma and Its Associated Risk Factors Among Children Aged 5-10 Years in a Rural Area of Coimbatore: A Community-Based Cross-Sectional Study

Introduction Asthma is one of the serious health problems among children, accounting for a major proportion of lost school days due to absenteeism, decreased academic performances, and lesser social interactions. It can impair a child's activities like playing sports and also their sleeping pattern with frequent school absenteeism. In South India, only a few school-based studies to determine the prevalence of asthma have been carried out, and even fewer studies are done in community settings in rural areas of Tamil Nadu. Hence, this community-based study was done to find out the prevalence of asthma among children aged 510 years in rural areas of Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu. Aim & objective To estimate the prevalence of asthma among children aged 5-10 years in rural areas of Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu. Materials and methods A community-based cross-sectional study was conducted in rural areas of Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu. A sample of 726 children from the randomly selected seven villages were studied. The sample size was calculated for a finite population. The standardized International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Childhood (ISAAC) questionnaire and calibrated instruments were used as data collection tools. Ethical approval was obtained. Data entry was done in Microsoft Excel and analyzed using the SPSS 19.0 version. The "t" test was used to compare the mean difference between the quantitative variables and the chi-square test was used to test the association between categorical variables. P-value <0.05 was considered as statistically significant. Results The overall prevalence of self-reported asthma was 5.1%. Boys had 1.7 times higher prevalence compared to girls. The prevalence of possible or suspected cases of asthma using the ISAAC screening questionnaire was 20.9%. In univariate analysis, the risk of having asthma among children is significantly higher among those with a positive family history of asthma. Conclusion The study found that the prevalence of self-reported asthma in rural settings is low (5.1%). However, our study also identifies a large number of children (20.9%) with symptoms suggestive of asthma using the ISAAC questionnaire that need the attention of a specialist for early diagnosis and care for reducing morbidity and episode severity.