Who: UAB Pediatric Asthma Program at The Children's Hospital of Alabama (aka Asthma Clinic). The Asthma Clinic is staffed by a physician, nurse practitioners, nurses, pharmacists, respiratory therapists, and a social worker all dedicated to providing excellent medical care and asthma self-management education for this high risk population. The practitioners who staff this clinic all have experience identifying and addressing the unique needs of poor, predominantly inner-city asthma patients.
What: The mission of the asthma clinic at Children's Hospital is to provide focused asthma management and education to children with poorly controlled asthma and their families. Children attending the Asthma Clinic have physician-diagnosed persistent asthma and have been referred because of recurrent ED visits and/or hospitalizations due to poorly controlled asthma.
Why: In 2008, Asthma Clinic at The Children's Hospital of Alabama had over 400 patient care visits. Patients were over 85% African-American and approximately 80% of these patients are publicly insured through Medicaid. The Asthma Clinic is staffed by a physician, nurse practitioners, nurses, pharmacists, respiratory therapists, and a social worker all dedicated to providing excellent medical care and asthma self-management education for this high-risk population.
Goals: To reduce the number of poor and inner-city children requiring care for asthma in the emergency department and/or on an in-patient basis due to lack of quality out-patient care that is designed to meet their unique needs.
Objectives:
1. Provide medical management of persistent asthma through at least three clinic visits per year with either MD or PNP and the licensed pharmacist.
2. Provide extensive asthma education to each patient in the following areas: disease process; asthma control; triggers; medications; and devices. Teaching is done by clinical staff and certified asthma educators.
3. Address the environmental issues that impact asthma control through social work intervention and home visits.
Activities: Asthma Clinic meets four times per month and the MD is available at three additional clinics during the week to meet urgent asthma needs. The Clinic sponsors an annual Reach Your Peak Asthma Camp for three days during the summer to provide fun and developmentally appropriate education for our patients.
Provides in-patient consultations to address medical, educational, and psychosocial needs relating to asthma.
Weekly interdisciplinary meetings to discuss patients and come up with the best course of action for the individual.
Outcomes: Asthma clinic completes approximately 400 patient visits each year and follows approximately 300 individual patients. 25 to 30 patients at a time receive intensive case management services and 50 children complete Reach Your Peak Asthma Camp each summer.
We are in the initial stages of tracking the outcomes of these patients compared to the general asthma population in the hospital which accounted for almost 900 hospitalizations in each of the past three years.