Study of population's knowledge about the spirometry and their characteristics: CONOCESPIRO

<bold>Aim:</bold> To analyze the population that comes to Primary Care (PC) to perform a spirometry, their characteristics and their knowledge about this test. <bold>Method:</bold> It is a descriptive, cross-sectional study aimed to over 15 years old patients(P), who had scheduled spirometry. They were asked to completed a survey (in person if they come to do the test or by phone if they didn’t) that included sociodemographic variables and data of patients' knowledge and perception about spirometry. <bold>Results:</bold> 1144P from 20 PC centers (17 in Barcelona and 3 in Madrid) were included. A 92% performed the spirometry, 45% suffered a respiratoty disease. The most frequent were: tobacco use (32%), ex-smoking (31%), asthma (18%) and COPD(12%). The most frequent symptom were dyspnea (40%) and sputum (30%). Regarding their educational background, 30% had primary studies and a 2% can’t read or write. Respecting of spirometry knowledge a 59% had done the test before, 76% knew what it consist of; only 23% of patients were informed about it with a leafleft. And 10% unknown the reason to do this test. 53%P were reminded of their appointment by pone, and 29% by SMS. Patients rated the test importance as 8.8/10, while the ease of the test was rated at 4’7/10. 15%P considered that spirometry wasn’t easy or not very easy to do. The mean delay for spirometry was 43.7±54.3 days. Most patients came on foot for the test(74%). <bold>Conclusions:</bold> 3 out of 4 patients say they knew spirometry. It is of great importance for the patient, but it is not easy to perform. Written explanations of the test were not frequent. More than 10% didn’t know the aim of the spirometry. It was detected a 8% of absenteeism despite reminders by telephone and/or SMS.