A Cochrane review [withdrawn from publication] included 7 trials that met the inclusion criteria. The written management plans were either peak flow or symptom based, which were compared against each other or compared to no written management plan. There was no consistent evidence that written plans produced better patient outcomes than no written plan. For some outcomes, there appeared to be an advantage of one type of plan over the other, but there was no consistency – one type of plan was not consistently more effective than another.