Evaluation of the Environmental Scoring System in Multiple Child Asthma Intervention Programs in Boston, Massachusetts
"Evaluation of the Environmental Scoring System in Multiple Child Asthma Intervention Programs in Boston, Massachusetts"
Dong
American Journal of Public Health
January 2018; 108(1): 103-111
Entire article
Objectives. To test the applicability of the Environmental Scoring System, a quick and simple approach for quantitatively measuring environmental triggers collected during home visits, and to evaluate its contribution to improving asthma outcomes among various child asthma programs.
Methods. We pooled and analyzed data from multiple child asthma programs in the Greater Boston Area, Massachusetts, collected in 2011 to 2016, to examine the association of environmental scores (ES) with measures of asthma outcomes and compare the results across programs.
Results. Our analysis showed that demographics were important contributors to variability in asthma outcomes and total ES, and largely explained the differences among programs at baseline. Among all programs in general, we found that asthma outcomes were significantly improved and total ES significantly reduced over visits, with the total Asthma Control Test score negatively associated with total ES.
Conclusions. Our study demonstrated that the Environmental Scoring System is a useful tool for measuring home asthma triggers and can be applied regardless of program and survey designs, and that demographics of the target population may influence the improvement in asthma outcomes.
Asthma Home Visit Questionnaire
Asthma Home Visit Questionnaire from the Boston Public Health Commission
This is a PDF printout of a form that was developed and lives in an online program called REDCap. REDCap is a free and secure online portal through which survey instruments and templates can be created and data can be securely stored. Several questions on the online form are prepopulated with multiple choices or drop-down menus. The PDF version prints all options listed for every question. It is recommended that anyone looking to adapt this tool prioritize their questions and determine the most suitable questionnaire format. If you have REDCap, we may be able to share the Data Dictionary (online template) for this questionnaire with you. Please direct any questions related to this questionnaire to asthma@bphc.org