Educational self-help approaches in childhood asthma.

Self-help is defined as "a process whereby a layperson functions on his/her own behalf in health promotion and prevention and in disease detection and treatment. . . ." Evidence that benefits are derived for patients who subscribe to the self-care philosophy comes from research in the areas of (1) self-efficacy, (2) information sharing, (3) patient satisfaction, and (4) patient involvement. This article presents five criteria of educational self-help. These criteria are: (1) encouragement of client responsibility, (2) full disclosure of information pertaining to the illness, (3) training of the patient in decision-making skills, (4) use of peer educators, and (5) training of professionals to encourage self-help attitudes and behaviors of their patients. The asthma projects presented at the June 1981 meeting in Los Angeles, entitled Self-management Educational Programs for Childhood Asthma, are reviewed in terms of the above five criteria. Each program manifested varying numbers of criteria with different levels of expertise. Findings suggest that those programs that most completely incorporated these principles tended to be more effective in favorably influencing behavioral, physiologic, and financial outcomes.