Evaluation of individualized asthma self-management programs

We compared the effectiveness of personalized asthma self-management recommendations with that of a group self-management program. We assigned each of 34 asthma patients randomly to one of three conditions: individualized asthma self-management, group asthma self-management, and control. We derived individualized self-management recommendations from patient recordings of asthma occurrence, asthma precipitants, and peak expiratory flow rate made during a 3-month period. The group program we used was the Wheezers Anonymous program. As compared to a control group of patients who received no self-management training, the patients in both the individualized and group condition evidenced improvement of pulmonary function, as measured daily with a home peak flow meter. The improvement was equivalent for patients in the two conditions. Patients in the individualized condition also exhibited a drop in frequency of asthma attacks, but patients in the group condition did not. We concluded that individualized asthma self-management is effective in reducing symptoms of asthma.