The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 268 No 7191 p419-425
30 March 2002

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Children given wrong inhalers

Large numbers of children are given inhalers they cannot use, say researchers. In a study of 1,519 children, they found that over one-third of those answering a questionnaire had been prescribed an unsuitable inhaler. Most of these had been prescribed a metered dose inhaler alone. Among children under five years, two-thirds of those prescribed a metered dose inhaler did not record using a spacer device. This fell to 17 per cent in children aged over five years (Archives of Disease in Childhood 2002;86:176).