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Objective This study tested a randomized controlled trial of RVA Breathes, a community asthma program, in reducing asthma-related healthcare utilization among children living in an area with a high poverty rate. Methods Participants included 250 caregivers (78% African American/Black; 73.3% household income<$25,000/year) and their children with asthma (5–11 years). Inclusion criteria included an asthma-related emergency department (ED) visit, hospitalization, unscheduled doctor's visit, or systemic steroids in the past 2 years. Families were randomized to a full active intervention (asthma education with community health workers [CHWs], home remediation with home assessors, and a school nurse component; n  = 118), partial active intervention (asthma education and home remediation; n  = 69), or a control group (n  = 63) for 9 months. Measures on healthcare utilization and asthma-related factors were collected. Follow-up assessments occurred across a 9-month period. Results Although we did not find any significant effects, there was a trend toward significance for a group by time effect with objective healthcare utilization as the outcome (F 4,365   =   2.28, p  =  .061). The full intervention group experienced a significant decrease from baseline to 9-month follow-up compared with the other groups (p  <  .001). Only the full intervention group experienced a significant increase in reported asthma action plans across time (no significant group effect). Conclusions In the context of the unprecedented COVID-19 pandemic, which led to a substantial global decrease in healthcare utilization, the study's main hypotheses were not supported. Nevertheless, findings support the benefit of community asthma programs that integrate care across multiple settings and connect families with CHWs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study was to examine the associations between child health, parent racial regard, and parent physical health in 87 African American and Black parents/caregivers of children with and without asthma from a low-income, under-resourced urban area. Participants completed the Private and Public Regard subscales of the Multidimensional Inventory of Black Identity (MIBI) and 12-item Short Form Health Survey (SF-12). Parents of children with asthma reported having poorer physical health, while those with higher public and private racial regard reported better physical health. The association between public regard and physical health was surpassed by an interaction of child asthma status and public regard: as public regard decreased, so did physical health, but only for parents raising a child with asthma. Findings suggest that the stresses associated with raising a child with chronic illness and perceiving lower public racial regard may together confer additional risk for poor physical health in African American and Black parents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]