Allergens in Inner-City Schools and Childhood Asthma (SICAS-1)

Boston Children's Hospital

Status: Completed

Conditions: Asthma

Study type: Observational

Funder types: Other; NIH

Identifiers

NCT01756391

R01 AI 0739654

Details and patient eligibility

About

Asthma is a disease that affects more than 12% of Americans under the age of 18 for over 14 million missed school days per year, and is the number one cause of school absences in America. Elementary school children spend 6 to 10 hours a day in school, and most of that time is spent in one classroom. The goals of this project are to provide an understanding of exposure risk factors specific to the classroom. This is critical, because the classroom environment could potentially be considered as an effective target for prevention of inner-city asthma morbidity by reducing exposures to many symptomatic children through an intervention in the school classrooms.

Enrollment: 351 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 4 to 15 years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Grades K-8 the school year following spring recruitment (Ages 4-15)
• Attend one of the schools in the fall where permission obtained for classroom sampling.
• Able to provide assent and parent/guardian able to provide informed consent Physician-Diagnosed asthma AND Wheezing in the previous 12 months

Exclusion criteria

• Significant pulmonary diseases other than asthma that might influence test results or pose risks (e.g., cystic fibrosis, sarcoidosis, bronchiectasis)
• Cardiovascular disease that requires daily medication
• Taking a beta blocker
• Active smoker
• Unable to follow through with study visit or complete study procedures