Action Towards Health Equity and Improved Air Quality in the Duwamish Valley: A Multilevel Asthma Intervention (DAISY)

University of Washington

Status: Enrolling

Conditions: Asthma in Children

Treatments: Other: Sham filter; Other: MERV 13 filter

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other; NIH

Identifiers

NCT06552013

1R01ES034749-01 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

STUDY00018735

Details and patient eligibility

About

The goal of this randomized control trial is to learn if box fans and filters can reduce asthma symptoms and improve indoor air quality in children ages 6 - 17 years old with asthma living in the Duwamish Valley, Seattle, Washington. The main question it aims to answer are:

• Do box fans with filters improve asthma symptoms?
• Do box fans with filters improve an objective measure used to monitor lung function known as forced expiratory volume during the first second (FEV1)? Researchers will compare children living in households with high quality filters to those in households with sham filters to see if air quality and asthma symptoms improve.

Participants will

• fill out several questionnaires
• monitor their lung function with a peak flow meter
• place an air monitor in their homes to monitor indoor air quality
• run the box fan when they are at home

Enrollment: 80 estimated patients

Sex: All

Ages: 6 to 17 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• age (6-17 years)
• poorly controlled physician diagnosed asthma defined as more than four days with asthma symptoms in the past two weeks, use of asthma rescue medication for more than four days in the past two weeks, or health care utilization due to asthma in the past year (hospitalization, emergency room visit, or unscheduled clinic visit)
• living in Georgetown and South Park neighborhoods of Seattle

Exclusion criteria

• children with unstable housing or shared custody arrangements

Trial design

Primary purpose: Prevention

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Double Blind

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80 participants in 2 patient groups

Sham filter

Experimental group

Description:

Participants in this arm will receive a sham filter for their box fans. These filters receive a MERV rating of 1 and only filter very large particles and debris such as lint, hair and insects. These particles have little to no impact on asthma symptoms. MERV stands for "minimum efficiency reporting value" and a filter receives a MERV rating as determined by the American Society of Heating, Refrigeration, and Air-Conditioning Engineers.

Treatment:

Other: Sham filter

MERV 13 filter

Experimental group

Description:

Participants in this arm will receive a MERV 13 filter for their box fans. MERV 13 filters trap the majority of small particles, as small as 1 micron. It also traps up to 75% of particles that are as small as 0.3 microns.

Treatment:

Other: MERV 13 filter