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Effectiveness of a multidisciplinary education protocol in children with asthma (0-4 years) in primary health care
1Department of Health Education, University of Limburg, Maastricht, The Netherlands.
Insights
Parents who received an asthma self-management protocol showed improved knowledge, attitudes, and self-efficacy in managing their child's asthma. This led to sustained behavioral changes and reduced healthcare utilization.
Area of Science:
- Pediatrics
- Public Health
- Health Education
Background:
- Childhood asthma requires effective self-management strategies for parents.
- Primary care settings offer opportunities for delivering asthma self-management education.
- Parental knowledge and self-efficacy are crucial for successful asthma management in young children.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate an asthma self-management protocol for parents of children aged 0-4 years.
- To assess the impact of the protocol on parental knowledge, attitudes, and self-efficacy.
- To determine the effect of the protocol on asthma self-management behaviors and healthcare utilization.
Main Methods:
- An experimental design was used to evaluate the protocol.
- The protocol comprised 16 educational modules developed based on needs assessment.
- Delivery involved general practitioners (GPs), community nurses, and doctors in child health centers.
Main Results:
- Parents in the treatment group demonstrated significantly increased knowledge, favorable attitudes, and higher self-efficacy regarding asthma self-management.
- Reported self-management behaviors increased significantly in the treatment group compared to the control group.
- One-year follow-up confirmed sustained changes and showed reduced physician office visits and reported asthma severity in the treatment group.
Conclusions:
- The asthma self-management protocol effectively improved parental knowledge, attitudes, and self-efficacy.
- Sustained improvements in self-management behaviors and reduced healthcare utilization were observed.
- The protocol shows promise for improving asthma care in young children through enhanced parental engagement.
Abstract:
This paper describes the results of an asthma self-management protocol delivered to parents of children aged 0-4 years. The protocol was delivered by general practitioners (GPs), community nurses, asthma nurses, and doctors to child health centers. It consisted of 16 educational modules developed after an initial needs assessment of parents and a task analysis of primary care practitioners. The program was evaluated by means of an experimental design. Parents participating in the program had significantly more knowledge, a more favorable attitude toward asthma, and a higher self-efficacy score with respect to performing asthma self-management behaviors. Also, they reported performing self-management behaviors more frequently than parents in the control group. One-year follow-up results, which were collected for parents in the treatment group only, showed that the described changes were sustained. Further, the treatment group was found to have decreased its emergency and nonemergency use of the physician's office and to have a reduction in (reported) asthma severity. Process evaluation indicated that most modules were provided by the GPs to nearly all parents. After parents had read the modules at home, almost all the information was discussed in the next contact. GPs seldom referred patients to the community nurses, although this was suggested in the protocol.