The prevalence of asthma, allergic rhinitis, and atopy in Antalya, Turkey.

Bronchial asthma is a common chronic inflammatory disorder of the airways that causes serious morbidity and mortality. The prevalence of the disorder has been increasing, especially in developed countries. The population-based asthma prevalence studies provide data from Ankara, Istanbul, Gaziantep, Trabzon, Izmnir, and Kayseri in our country and asthma prevalence ranges between 1.4 and 3%. However, the prevalence of adult asthma in our city was not known. We aimed to determine the prevalence of asthma, allergic rhinitis, and atopy in the adult population of Antalya and compare the data with other countries and other regions of our country. The European Commission Respiratory Health Survey, the first study to assess the geographical variation in asthma and allergic diseases, provided comparable data from 22 countries and 140,000 individuals. Therefore, the European Commission Respiratory Health Survey protocol was preferred in our study. The first stage consisted of 1000 subjects; of these 1000 subjects, 200 subjects were randomly selected for the second stage. The response rates were 99.5 and 55.4% for stages I and II, respectively. The current prevalence of asthma, allergic rhinitis, and atopy in Antalya was 9.4, 27.7, and 31.1%, respectively. The most prevalent type of sensitization was mite allergy detected in 31 (20.9%) subjects. Sensitization to more than one allergen was frequent in subjects with asthma and allergic rhinitis. Bronchial asthma, allergic rhinitis, and atopy are frequent in our city and when compared with previous studies performed in Turkey, the highest results were in Antalya.