This study provides data on the sources of asthma diagnoses in the adult Bangladeshi population in urban and rural settings. The paper also reports the prevalence of self-reported asthma diagnoses and associated socio-demographic factors. A cross-sectional study was conducted in three communities: two rural settings and one urban setting, with a total sample size of 32,665 subjects. Pre-existing surveillance data provided individual socio-demographic factors. Provider categories were based on previous research describing provider plurality in Bangladesh. Descriptive statistics, univariate regression and multivariate regression analyses were performed. Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) generalists provided the largest proportion of diagnoses in both urban (54.6%) and rural (42.4%) sites. The largest proportion of non-MBBS-trained healthcare workers providing diagnoses of asthma was spiritual healers (13.3%) in the urban settings and village doctors (42.4%) in rural settings. The overall prevalence of self-reported asthma diagnoses was 5.0% in the urban population and 3.5% in the rural population. The results highlight the importance of non-MBBS doctors in serving the healthcare needs of the Bangladeshi population. This study reveals a higher prevalence of self-reported asthma diagnoses in the urban setting than in rural ones, which is consistent with international literature on the topic.

Item Type:	Refereed Article
Keywords:	Asthma, Bangladesh
Research Division:	Health Sciences
Research Group:	Epidemiology
Research Field:	Epidemiology not elsewhere classified
Objective Division:	Health
Objective Group:	Public health (excl. specific population health)
Objective Field:	Health status (incl. wellbeing)
UTAS Author:	Khanam, MA (Dr Masuma Khanam)
ID Code:	113718
Year Published:	2013
Web of Science® Times Cited:	5
Deposited By:	Health Sciences
Deposited On:	2017-01-16
Last Modified:	2017-11-07
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