Nebulizer Intervention for Minority Children With Asthma

September 3, 2008 updated by: National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR)
To determine if teaching parents and children to identify the child's asthma symptoms early and if teaching the appropriate use of a nebulizer will result in a decrease in emergency department visits.

Study Overview

Detailed Description

Nebulizer use in young children is common with prevalence of 33-71% in children under age 12 years. Nebulizers are used primarily to administer SABA medications, (i.e., albuterol) and some anti-inflammatory medications (i.e., budesonide, cromolyn). Parents may prefer nebulizer delivery due to the inability of young children to coordinate respiration with aerosol delivery and many parents lack confidence in administering metered-dose inhaler (MDI) medications to young children. Physician preference for nebulizer administration of asthma medications is low, but is favored due to direct medication delivery to the respiratory system despite studies indicating MDIs with spacers are as effective as nebulizers in delivering asthma medications to young children. Although national guidelines recommend a nebulizer with mask for children 2 years or younger most asthma educational programs lack specific content addressing appropriate nebulizer technique including when and what symptoms to treat at home, optimal length of a nebulized medication session, prevention of SABA overuse and appropriate cleaning and maintenance of the device. Because the overuse of home nebulizer SABA medications has been associated with fatal asthma, instruction and supervision of nebulized rescue medication delivery in addition to appropriate preventive medication use may reduce asthma morbidity and mortality .

The current study was conducted to determine the effectiveness of a home-based nebulizer educational intervention (NEI) for young children with asthma. The intervention was designed to teach early symptom recognition, appropriate medication use and nebulizer technique for home treatment of acute asthma episodes. Study outcomes included symptom frequency, activity limitation, emergency department (ED) visits and hospitalizations, appropriate asthma medication use and nebulizer practice. We hypothesized that children receiving the NEI would demonstrate improvement in appropriate nebulizer and asthma medication use and decreased asthma symptoms, activity limitation, ED visits and hospitalizations.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

221

Phase

  • Phase 3

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Locations

    • Maryland
      • Baltimore, Maryland, United States, 21287
        • Johns Hopkins University

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

2 years to 8 years (Child)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Physician diagnosed asthma, use of nebulizer in past 30 days, wheezing or cough symptoms at least weekly during the past 30 days.

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Participation in another asthma study or having other respiratory illness such as cystic fibrosis, BPD

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: None (Open Label)

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: 1
Asthma Education
Other: 2
Asthma Education

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Time Frame
We hypothesized that children receiving the NEI would demonstrate improvement in appropriate nebulizer and asthma medication use and decreased asthma symptoms, activity limitation, ED visits, and hospitalizations.
Time Frame: 12 Months
12 Months

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Arlene M Butz, SCD,MSN,BSN, Johns Hopkins University

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start

August 1, 2000

Primary Completion (Actual)

December 1, 2005

Study Completion (Actual)

December 1, 2005

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

September 20, 2005

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

September 20, 2005

First Posted (Estimate)

September 22, 2005

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Estimate)

September 5, 2008

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

September 3, 2008

Last Verified

September 1, 2008

More Information

Terms related to this study

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

Clinical Trials on Asthma

Clinical Trials on Nebulizer Education Intervention

3
Subscribe