Asthma is the most common chronic childhood disease. It is known to be influenced by social determinants of health. This study from The Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology: In Practice, reviews social determinants of asthma and how to address them in the clinical setting. When discussing social determinants, the researchers highlight housing, overall neighborhood safety, and access to care as social factors that can determine the effectiveness of a patient’s asthma treatment plan.
Screening for socioeconomic and environmental factors can be difficult to integrate into clinical practice. For this reason, the researchers propose a framework that can be used to identify and address social determinants of asthma in the clinical setting. It is not yet clear which screening interventions are most effective. However, given that most clinical approaches do not deal with these issues at all, any improvement is welcome and likely to impact vulnerable populations [1].
Source:
[1] Federico, M. J., McFarlane, A. E., Szefler, S. J., & Abrams, E. M. (2020). The Impact of Social Determinants of Health on Children with Asthma. The Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology: In Practice, 8(6), 1808–1814. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaip.2020.03.028
