Interactive Multimedia for In-Home Asthma Education

Asthma is a major public health problem, with its incidence and severity increasing despiteprogress in treatment. Statistics indicate that 7% of 6 -11-year-olds are affected. Hospitalizations ofchildren have increased fivefold in the past two decades. However, research indicates that educationcan be effective in reducing the number of attacks, the number of emergency room visits andhospitalizations, the number of missed school days, and health care costs. The long-term objective ofthis project is to develop an interactive multimedia product that assists elementary school-aged childrenwith asthma and their families in effectively managing the disease. This product is intended for in-homeuse, but will be compatible with existing asthma education curricula. Phase I will focus on investigatingthe feasibility of developing such a product and assessing the receptivity of the target audiences to it.There are several specific objectives: 1) analyze currently available asthma education materials andassess the adaptability of core content to an interactive multimedia application, 2) develop a preliminarydesign document, 3)develop and test prototype materials, and 4) develop a design document for aninteractive multimedia product and submit in Phase I final report.