Asthma management and environmental tobacco smoke exposure reduction in Latino children: a controlled trial.

OBJECTIVES

This study tested the efficacy of coaching to reduce environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) exposure among asthmatic Latino children.

DESIGN

After asthma management education, families were randomly assigned to no additional service (control condition) or to coaching for ETS exposure reduction (experimental condition).

SETTING

The study was conducted in San Diego, California.

PARTICIPANTS

Two hundred four Latino children (ages 3-17 years) with asthma participated.

INTERVENTION

Approximately 1.5 hours of asthma management education was provided; experimental families also obtained 7 coaching sessions ( approximately 45 minutes each) to reduce ETS exposure.

OUTCOME MEASURES

Reported ETS exposure and children's urine cotinine were measured.

RESULTS

Parents in the coached condition reported their children exposed to significantly fewer cigarettes than parents of control children by 4 months (postcoaching). Reported prevalence of exposed children decreased to 52% for the coached families, but only to 69% for controls. By month 4, mean cotinine levels decreased among coached and increased among control children. Cotinine prevalence decreased from 54% to 40% among coached families, while it increased from 43% to 49% among controls. However, cotinine levels decreased among controls to the same level achieved by coached families by the 13-month follow-up.

CONCLUSIONS

Asthma management education plus coaching can reduce ETS exposure more than expected from education alone, and decreases in the coached condition may be sustained for about a year. The delayed decrease in cotinine among controls is discussed.