Purpose: As an early care and education provider, you play a major role in the health and safety of the children in your care. With the current asthma rate among California’s youngest children (0-5 years) at almost 10 percent, it is estimated that a classroom or center with 20 children may have two or more children with asthma in it.

Thus, it is essential that early care and education providers understand asthma and know how to provide the highest-quality care for children with asthma. With proper care, most children with asthma can lead normal, active lives and can enter school with the same abilities as other children.

For this purpose, the Asthma Information Packet for Early Care and Education Providers was designed to cover the following topics:

• Basic information on asthma
• How to improve the early care and education environment to reduce asthma triggers
• How to administer asthma medication
• How to handle asthma emergencies

What's is Asthma? Asthma is a chronic disease of the respiratory system in which the airway occasionally constricts, becomes inflamed, and is lined with excessive amounts of mucus, often in response to one or more triggers. These episodes may be triggered by such things as exposure to an environmental stimulant (or allergen), cold air, warm air, moist air, exercise or exertion, or emotional stress. In children, the most common triggers are viral illnesses such as those that cause the common cold. This airway narrowing causes symptoms such as wheezing, shortness of breath, chest tightness, and coughing. The airway constriction responds to bronchodilators. Between episodes, most patients feel well but can have mild symptoms and they may remain short of breath after exercise for longer periods of time than the unaffected individual. The symptoms of asthma, which can range from mild to life threatening, can usually be controlled with a combination of drugs and environmental changes.

Public attention in the developed world has recently focused on asthma because of its rapidly increasing prevalence, affecting up to one in four urban children. (More news from Wikipeida.org)

Download Asthma Information Handbook for Early Care and Education Providers

Pdf format, 1.9mb, 50pages.

Produced by the California Childcare Health Program, Funded by First 5 California.

Visit California Childcare Health Program Official Website

Established in 1987, the California Childcare Health Program is a community-based program of the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) School of Nursing, Department of Family Health Care Nursing. Our multidisciplinary team staffs our toll-free Child Care Healthline, trains professionals on health and safety issues related to early care and education settings, and conducts research. We produce a wealth of materials on health and safety in early care and education settings for professionals and families.

The mission of the California Childcare Health Program is to improve the quality of child care by initiating and strengthening linkages between the health, safety and child care communities and the families they serve.

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