A Comparison of Child and Parent Reporting of Asthma Severity and Emotional Health From the Child Health Information Reporting Project (CHIRP): Does Smoke Exposure Matter?

Jeralyn Bernier ¹, Linda Radecki ², Lynn M Olson ², Kevin B Weiss ³ and Robert M Siegel ¹. ¹Cincinnati Pediatric Research Group, Cincinnati Childrens Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH; ²Department of Practice and Research, American Academy of Pediatrics, Elk Grove Village, IL and ³Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, Chicago, IL.

 

Background: Unfortunately, children with asthma often live in homes with smoke exposure. There is no information, however, on whether smoke exposure relates to how children and their parents perceive the childs asthma severity or the impact of the illness.

 

Objective: To compare how children and their parents perceive the childs asthma severity and emotional health in homes with and without smoke exposure.

 

Design/Methods: Children 7-16 years of age and one of their parents completed questionnaires including the Childrens Health Survey for Asthma (CHSA). Paired t-test and Chi-square analysis were used as appropriate.

 

Results: 203 child-parent pairs have completed the study to date. 64% of children were male, 49% African American, 35% Caucasian and 12% were Hispanic. The mean age of the children was 10.7 years. 19% of parents reported themselves as smokers and 33% of this group smoked near their child. 23% of parents compared to 34% of children reported a smoker in the home, p<0.001. While parents reported similar scores of their childs emotional health in smoking and nonsmoking homes, children who identified a smoker in the home had higher scores of feeling left out (4.19 vs 4.49), sad (4.22 vs 4.53), and upset (3.97 vs 4.37) about having asthma then children who did not identify a smoker in the home, p<0.05. Also, parents of children who reported a smoker were more likely to report their childs asthma as mild (49%) then parents in non-smoking homes (40%), p<0.05.

 

Conclusions: There is a discrepancy in how children with asthma and parents report smoke exposure. Children who report smoke exposure may be more likely to report emotional health difficulties than non-smoke exposed children. Parents of smoke exposed children may under-report asthma severity and emotional health problems in their children.