August 24, 2005
The National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute recently awarded associate professor Betsy Sleath, PhD, a $1.6 million grant for a four-year project, “Children and Asthma: Communication and Outcomes.”
The project will study the relationship between provider-child-caregiver communication during pediatric asthma visits and child outcomes. As part of the project, 360 children between eight and 15 years of age who have mild, moderate or severe persistent asthma and their caregivers will be enrolled at eight private pediatric practices across the state. The children’s medical visits will be audio-tape recorded and home visits will be conducted one month after their medical visits. The goal of the project is to examine what types of communication patterns are related to better child outcomes.
“I have been studying provider-patient communication between adults and their doctors for years,” said Sleath, the study’s principal investigator. “After I had my daughter, I realized how important pediatrician-parent-child communication can be about medications. Having a sick child can be very stressful, especially with a disease like asthma. This project is important because it will help us understand how provider-patient communication is related to how well a child’s asthma is controlled. We hope the results of the study can be used to develop interventions for families and clinics on how to improve communication in ways that can help the child feel better. We are excited to be working with pediatric practices from across the state.”
Other UNC members of the research team are co-principal investigator Guadalupe (Suchi) Ayala, PhD, assistant professor, and Karin Yeatts, PhD, research assistant professor, from the School of Public Health; Dennis Williams, PharmD, associate professor, and William Campbell, PhD, professor, from the School of Pharmacy; and Stephanie Davis, MD, assistant professor in the School of Medicine and a UNC pediatric pulmonologist.
The National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute is part of the National Institutes of Health, the Federal Government’s primary agency for biomedical and behavioral research.
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