Life with a lung condition - how you're helping us push for change
From January to March 2023, we ran our largest ever survey asking you about your care and experiences of living with a lung condition. Anna from our Data + Insights team explains what the survey was and how your responses are helping us fight for better lung health for all.
What we wanted to find out
We asked to hear your voices and you delivered – we had an amazing response, over 14,000 in total. If you are one of our respondents, we thank you for helping us and giving us your time to fill in the survey!
We asked over 70 questions to find out about:
your diagnosis
how you manage your lung condition
your symptoms
your triggers
your experience of healthcare
your treatments and inhalers
how air pollution affects you
how the cost-of-living crisis has impacted you.
We heard from people from all over the UK, of different ages, ethnicities, and income levels. We have been busy analysing all this data and using it to guide our work. We have looked at this data at different levels. Firstly, we looked at trends across all lung conditions. And then we looked at specific lung conditions, to see how experiences and opinions differ depending on your lung condition. This is the first time we asked these questions to people with lung conditions other than asthma and COPD so these insights are really valuable.
The link between lung health and deprivation
The results clearly indicated household income significantly impacts people's ability to manage their lung condition as well as to access vital healthcare services. These findings were shocking. We found that the cost-of-living crisis is impacting deprived communities the most. Basic necessities such as food, prescriptions and heating are unaffordable and out of reach which reduces a person’s ability to manage their lung condition well.
Our analysis showed that, of the poorest survey respondents:
One in four are struggling with breathlessness every day.
Nearly half (46%) of those who pay for prescriptions said they couldn’t afford to pay for them, compared to just 6% of the highest income group.
Seven out of 10 (71%) respondents with asthma live with uncontrolled asthma putting them at greater risk of having a potentially life-threatening asthma attack.
Only just over a third (37%) were able to access same-day GP care, compared to half (50.1%) of the highest earners.
They were more than twice as likely as the highest earners to give up work in the last year due to breathlessness.
Seven out of 10 felt their lung condition has worsened and nearly two thirds (61%) feel that they need more support with their condition now than they did a year ago.
Taking action on lung health inequalities
This is unfair and highlights the link between lung health and deprivation. Asthma + Lung UK believes no one should have to suffer worse health because of where they live, or how much money they have. This is why we have written a report, which goes into detail on the link between poverty and lung health. In it, we call on the government to urgently prioritise lung health and give people who are most at risk a fighting chance of being able to breathe without fear.
Better lung health for all
The data from the Life with a Lung Condition survey has been invaluable and are really helping us to push for better lung health. So far we have used the data for:
our report on how health inequalities affect people with lung conditions – Breathing Unequal
our report on asthma in Wales – Raising the Bar
our report on diagnostics in England
our clean air campaigns.
We have lots of other exciting plans for this work including:
writing an academic paper on the latest patient views on environmentally friendly inhalers.
presenting results at international academic conferences.
We run this survey every year and we’re interested to find out what questions you think we should be asking. You can find the questions we asked this time here. You can email us here with your thoughts on this.