Open Airways for Schools: Description of a Program Modification

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to describe the modification of the Open Airways for Schools (OAS) program for use with children age 8-12 years old who had moderate to severe persistent asthma. The modified program (mOAS) was delivered in a location outside of the usual school setting over three sessions as compared to the usual six. Participants in the program demonstrated improved asthma knowledge. These findings were compared with outcomes from the original OAS program and demonstrate that the mOAS program is also effective at increasing children’s asthma knowledge. Participants in the intervention group had significantly higher asthma knowledge scores when compared with the control group. (F=19.028,p<.001). While the modified program performed well it is not known if it performs equally as well as the original program. Future studies should be done comparing mOAS and OAS in a population of children with moderate to severe asthma to determine if the programs are in fact equal.