A strategy for measuring health outcomes and evaluating impacts of interventions on asthma and COPD—common chronic respiratory diseases in Global Alliance against Chronic Respiratory Diseases (GARD) countries

The use of standardized, evidence-based indicators is essential for the assessment of risk factors for chronic respiratory diseases (CRDs) and their overall burden, as well as the evaluation of clinical and public health interventions across countries (1). The collection and reporting of accurate and timely health information, including disease-specific measures of morbidity and mortality, helps to direct the allocation of health care resources and optimizes decision making in health policy. International comparisons of CRD burden are primarily drawn from existing population-based studies. For example, the International Study of Asthma and Allergy in Childhood (ISAAC) has provided information on the prevalence of asthma symptoms in children using samples from 56 countries (2). The European Community Respiratory Health Survey is another example of the standardized collection of information from multiple countries, providing abundant information on morbidity, risk factors and the cost of CRDs (3). There are also the PLATINO studies (4) and the BOLD studies (5), which have examined the burden of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) across Latin America and other continents, respectively. Existing CRD work by the World Health Organization (WHO) includes a report of findings from the World Health Survey (6), iterations of the Global Burden of Diseases reports (7), and the GARD Basket (8)