Only limited involvement with the Schools was mentioned. We are looking in the Albany NY area to focus attention in schools serving our high asthma impact geographic areas (hospital admissions, readmissions, and ED visits), since the schools:
- Represent a high density of out of control asthmatics (particularly Elementary schools)
- Provide another communications link between health providers, parents, and students for coordination
- Have an environment where the children spend 1/3 of their life for trigger mitigation (apply healthy homes concepts to health schools), and
- Have a public responsibility/accountability for the building
We also have Medicaid Waiver funding available over the next 6 years to address these issues.
What would be your priorities to address asthma in our Schools based on your experiences?
We currently have an EPA
We currently have an EPA Indoor Air Quality grant for schools in addition to our ashtma Healthy Homes program.
I would suggest that these be some of the priorities ( my staff would know more)
Have an asthma action plan on file for each child
Refer children to any available Healthy Homes program
Train staff re: asthma and how to respond to asthma attacks
Refer schools to EPA's tools for schools website - lots of great information.
Some common issues we have found as a result of school assessments include: