Healthy Lung delivers positive impact to Asthma & COPD management

Nitin Kapoor, company president, AstraZeneca Vietnam & Asia Area Frontier Markets

On November 13, AstraZeneca and its partners announced the outcomes of the Healthy Lung programme ahead of the 24^th Congress of the Asian Pacific Society of Respirology in Hanoi.

In Vietnam, major Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) including cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, asthma, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are increasing rapidly, accounting for 73 per cent of all deaths and 66 per cent of the total burden of disease. One of the solutions proposed in the National Strategy for prevention and control of NCDs in 2015-2025 is to enhance detection, treatment, and management at the community health level for people with cancer, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, COPD, asthma, and other NCDs, ensuring the provision of on-going management, monitoring, and care services for patients.

To improve asthma and COPD management in Vietnam, the three-year Healthy Lung programme is a partnership designed to improve the quality of outpatient management of asthma and COPD in Vietnam since its inception in 2017. As of October 2019, the programme has delivered outcomes based on three key pillars.

The first one is partnerships and awareness. The programme has addressed current gaps in asthma and COPD management by contributing to the creation of national guidelines for asthma and COPD management which has been applied in the Healthy Lung programme from 2017-2020.

Besides, nationwide, the programme has established 65 centres of excellence, known as UMAC (Unit of Management for Asthma and COPD). In addition, the programme has helped to manage more than 89,000 patients with asthma and COPD, diagnosed 4,642 people at risk with the respiratory disease, and educated more than 11,325 patients through patient clubs about the management of asthma and COPD.

Another important sector is understanding and skills. The programme has provided continuous medical training education for more than 1,410 healthcare professionals (HCPs), with 94 HCPs and nurses certified.

During the conference, data recorded from 12 months in Haiphong Tuberculosis and Lung Disease Hospital’s UMAC showed the decrease in the hospitalisation rate of patients with asthma from 29.3 to 6.2 per cent, while the hospitalisation rate for patients with COPD decreased from 51 to 32 per cent. The number of patients that this UMAC helped to partly control asthma increased by 50 per cent, while there is an increase of 28.1 per cent of patients who can fully control the disease. Overall, UMAC has delivered significant reduction of uncontrolled cases by 78.1 per cent.

With the improved patient outcomes demonstrated from at Haiphong Tuberculosis and Lung Disease Hospital's UMAC, AstraZeneca and its partners have announced their continued commitment in an observational study to measure the impact of the Healthy Lung programme.

This study will measure the data of clinical benefits such as the characteristics of respiratory disease (level of disease control, rate of exacerbation, lung function) and therapeutics used in basic asthma and COPD treatment as well as patients’ compliance to treatment. In addition, the study will provide a cost-effective solution to manage asthma and COPD from the Healthy Lung programme. The results of the study is expected to be available in the fourth quarter of 2020 with the hope that the UMAC model can be replicated nationwide.

Nitin Kapoor, company president, AstraZeneca Vietnam and Asia Area Frontier Markets, shared: “Healthy Lung is part of AstraZeneca’s commitment to improving the health of the Vietnamese people. We are pleased to collaborate with our partners to implement this study with improved outcomes. We will foster this partnership so that the benefits from Healthy Lung can continue to making a positive impact on patients beyond 2020.”