What?

The Asthma Management Program aims to reduce emergency department visits and hospitalization due to asthma among Montgomery County Latino children by:

• Empowering Latino families to appropriately self-manage their children with asthma.
• Increasing awareness and utilization of pediatric clinical services.

• Developing culturally and linguistically appropriate asthma management interventions.

Why?

Asthma is a serious public health problem that disproportionately affects poor and minority children. For this reason in 2005 the Latino Health Initiative, with the technical assistance of the University of Maryland School of Medicine, engaged in formative evaluation data collection activities (focus groups, health care provider interviews, literature review) to assess knowledge, attitudes, and practices among low-income Montgomery County Latino parents of children with asthma.  Based on this formative evaluation, the LHI designed a culturally and linguistically competent intervention.

How?

The Asthma Management Program provides an intervention with three components:

•  Group sessions.
  • Eight 2-hour education sessions.
  • The sessions are informed by adult and popular education theory and facilitated in Spanish.
  • Each 2-hour session addresses a specific theme in asthma management.
• Social support.
  • Provided by a group of trained asthma management coaches (foreign-trained nurses known as “Consedus,” a combination of the words for “counselor” and “educator” in Spanish.)
  • Consedus answer questions, identify barriers and issues faced by families, and help identify solutions.
• Follow-up.
  • Provided between education sessions through individualized follow-up phone calls.
  • Two-hour follow-up session conducted 6 to 9 months after the intervention to reinforce asthma knowledge, management skills, and adherence to a personalized asthma action plan.

Who?

The Latino Health Initiative of the Montgomery County Department of Health and Human Services began the Asthma Management Program with a grant from the Center for Maternal and Child Health, Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.  The target population of the program is low-income Latino parents/caregivers of Latino children 4 to 11 years old diagnosed with asthma and living in Montgomery County.

Asthma Program Partners

• School Health Services
• Linkages to Learning Program
• University of Maryland School of Public Health
• Maryland Asthma Control Program
• Center for Health Disparities, Adventist HealthCare Inc.
• Spanish Catholic Center
• CASA de Maryland

Community Asthma Advisory Committee

• Olivia Carter-Pokras, PhD, University of Maryland School of Public Health
• Gloria Ortiz, MS, National Heart Lung and Blood Institute
• Alvaro Simmons, MSED, MSW, LCSW, Community Activist
• Carlos Picone, MD, FCCP, FACP
• Ladys Lux, RN, MSN, Montgomery County DHHS, School Health Services, School-Based Health Center at Broad Acres Elementary School
• Cielo Rivera, mother of child with asthma
• Jose Rivera, father of child with asthma
• Favian Fredes, father of child with asthma
• Elizabeth Torrez, mother and grandmother of children with asthma
• Claudia Zepeda, asthma management coach (“Consedu”)

Resources

• Brochure: “El Asma y Nuestros Niños” (in Spanish)
• Curriculum (Description in English)
• Curriculum (Description in Spanish) [Coming soon]
• Latino Asthma Management Program Fact Sheet
• Newsletter (in Spanish)
• Parents Asthma Handout (Description in English)  [Coming soon]