Research
This workstream is a new innovation which seeks to expand the work of UKIG into the area of evidence-based research. Research is an integral part of ensuring that health services are of the highest quality and informed by the best available and most up-to-date evidence. While there is a significant investment to promote research aimed at improving the health and social care of the population, UKIG believes that it can effectively contribute to further research relating very specifically to inhaled medications. UKIG’s constituent members provide clinical expertise relating to inhaled medications, inhaler therapies, and devices. When combined with clinical evidence from small-scale research projects and integrated with patient and caregivers needs, interests, and values, can effectively contribute in identifying the best care available to improve patient outcomes.
Inhalers as Medication
While inhaled medication is the cornerstone of treatment for many people with respiratory diseases, patients’ perceptions and use of their inhalers does vary. This area of work is a priority for UKIG with our aim being to increase patient awareness, understanding, and engagement with inhaled medications.
Our Research Focus
The research relating to our priority activity has commenced. We are working with Imperial College London to design a Patient Survey.
"You and your Inhalers" has been designed to capture the views of individuals who use inhaled medication to manage their respiratory condition(s).
A link to the survey is available on this website. Visit our News and Activity page for more information.
Individuals who are prescribed at least one inhaler are asked to take 10 minutes to complete the survey to help UKIG better understand how people use inhaled medication in their everyday lives.
Emergency Care
Every 10 seconds someone in the UK suffers a potentially life-threatening asthma attack (Asthma UK 2018). Asthma is one of a range of respiratory conditions treated with inhaled therapies and reliever medication is the mainstay of treatment for acute exacerbations and attacks. Understanding how patients view and use their inhalers during an acute episode and how this may influence the outcome in an emergency situation will help ensure that UKIG gets the right message out to both patients and practitioners, and will enable us to influence best practice and improve patient outcome. As a result, our aim is to complete an information analysis on a small, selected group of patients to examine how terms such as emergency, acute episode, or attack are interpreted by individuals and how that influences their use of inhaled medication.
Environment Issues
As part of our green agenda, the research and development workstream are aiming to conduct small-scale projects relating to the environmental impact of inhalers and issues of recycling. The research initially seeks to focus on patients’ awareness of green issues and inhaler medication and their current involvement in recycling schemes and their future willingness to engage in such schemes. These findings will inform UKIG’s plans for a virtual recycling campaign, specifically enabling us to gather ideas about how we can enhance the recycling work which is already underway.