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APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Betty Perez-Rivera, EdD, CHES and Natalie Langston-Davis, MD, MPH. Children's Health Fund, Children's Hospital at Montefiore, 317 E. 64th Street, New York, NY 10021, 212-535-9779, bperez@chfund.org

Asthma is the most common pediatric illness, disproportionately affecting children in poor, medically underserved, urban populations. Prevalence rates in low-income minority populations are more than double the national average. Increasing asthma awareness in these communities, in particular, can empower families to take control of their asthma through active management of their environmental triggers. The Children's Health Fund's, Childhood Asthma Initiative (CAI) has created several innovative educational curricula to help create asthma friendly communities by enhancing knowledge about characteristics, symptoms, triggers, and medications for asthma. NYC public schools are only required to show teachers an asthma video as part of staff development and provide Open Airways workshops for asthmatic children. With a shortage of school nurses, even these requirements are often not met. In contrast, CAI's curricula are tailored for parents, community members and student populations. Train-the-Trainer workshops are offered to health care and child care professionals to increase the dissemination of asthma information. Educational programs engage all participants with special consideration for different learning styles, using auditory, visual, and interactive programs and utilizing low-literacy reading materials. Programs include music and asthma workshops and also special curriculum expansion programs that allow asthma education to be incorporated into daily academic activities. More than 4000 community members and students within NYC public schools have participated in our educational programs since October 2004. Upon evaluation, students participating in the curriculum expansion showed a 62% increase in knowledge. Programs are highly replicable for diverse populations; they were implemented in Washington, DC in January 2006.

Learning Objectives:

• The program will describe innovative educational programs for availability to all community residents.
• Participants will identify ways to incorporate similar programs their health educational activities.

Keywords: Community Education, Health Education

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Not Answered

Handout (.ppt format, 12185.5 kb)