Knowledge and Attitude of General Practitioners Regarding Pediatric Asthma and Allergy

Background: Asthma and allergy symptoms are usually intermittent in nature and may not manifest in the clinical examination to the extent that affect the patient; this presents a challenge to the general practitioners (GPs) or the patient in the diagnosis and follow-up treatment phases. Methods: The present cross-sectional study was conducted on 175 GPS. For collecting the data, the researchers-made online version of the Knowledge and Attitude questionnaire was uploaded in virtual networks, and all GPS were individually asked to fill the questionnaires. Data analysis was carried out using mean, standard deviation, ANOVA, independent t and regression statistical tests in SPSS ver. 16. Results: It was found that 134 (76.6%) of the GPs had a partially true attitude and 41 (23.4%) of them had an excellent attitude. Also, GPs had moderate and excellent knowledge in 157 (89.7%) and 18 (10.3%) cases, respectively. The mean +/- SD of the overall score of knowledge and attitude towards asthma was equal to 55.04 +/- 3.98. The overall score of the questionnaire and the score of all of its domains significantly correlated with age and years of work experience (p<0.05). Conclusion: Considering that most of the GPs in the present study had moderate knowledge and attitude towards asthma management, it is necessary to conduct educational interventions for this group of medical staff.