Archives of the Mayor's Press Office

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Date: Wednesday, August 2, 2000

Release #301-00


Contact: Sunny Mindel/ Lynn Rasic (212) 788-2958
  Sandra Mullin/ John Gadd (DOH) (212) 788-5290




MAYOR GIULIANI ANNOUNCES NYC CHILDHOOD ASTHMA HOSPITALIZATION RATES DECREASE SIGNIFICANTLY

Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani today announced that the hospitalization rate for children 0-14 years of age with asthma in New York City decreased significantly, by 27.4%, from 1997 to 1998 and acknowledged the Health Department's Childhood Asthma Initiative for its efforts to reduce the public health burden of asthma in New York City.

Mayor Giuliani was joined at City Hall by City Council Speaker Peter F. Vallone, Health Commissioner Neal L. Cohen, M.D., Health and Hospitals Corporation President Luis Marcos, M.D., New York City Childhood Asthma Initiative Director Louise Cohen, and Lorna Davis, Director of Health Services of the Center for Children and Families, Jamaica, New York.

"The New York City Childhood Asthma Initiative has laid the important groundwork necessary for reversing asthma trends in New York City," Mayor Giuliani said. "Although asthma can cause serious illness, we know and today's data reveal that when asthma is properly treated, children can lead normal lives. The Health Department, the Health and Hospitals Corporation and all the organizations they have worked with over the past several years are obviously making an important difference in improving the management of this disease."

"All New Yorkers can rejoice in the success of the Childhood Asthma Initiative," Speaker Vallone said. "The City Council played a significant role by funding local initiatives through the City Health Department and promoting educational outreach efforts to help people manage this disease. The initiative has also resulted in better response times and shorter hospital emergency room waits. All of this translates into a better quality of life for asthma sufferers and their families."

Health Commissioner Neal Cohen said, "We are encouraged by the decline in childhood asthma hospitalizations in New York City. Just as there are a number of factors which can result in asthma symptoms, there is likely to be no single reason for the decline in asthma hospitalization. However, through the New York City Childhood Asthma Initiative, we have been able to mobilize the larger healthcare community as well as bring much needed information to families and caregivers. I am pleased that all these efforts are showing that we can effectively reverse the trends of the past decade."

In 1998, there were 10,727 hospitalizations for asthma among children ages 0-14 years old (7.2 hospitalizations per 1,000 children) representing a decline of 27.4% from the 14,780 hospitalizations (9.9 hospitalizations per 1,000 children) in 1997. Among children ages 0-4 years old, the asthma hospitalization rate decreased 27.8% from 16.0 per 1,000 children in 1997 (8,202 hospitalizations) to 11.6 per 1,000 children in 1998 (5,922 hospitalizations).

Among the other findings announced today:

  • Between 1997 and 1998, asthma hospitalization rates decreased in all five boroughs, especially among children 14 years of age or younger: by 33.2% in the Bronx; 27.0% in Manhattan; 24.4% in Queens; 23.3% in Brooklyn; and by 21.8% in Staten Island.

  • Hospitalization rates decreased by a dramatic 28.3% in the Hunts Point-Mott Haven community of the South Bronx, a neighborhood where the Department of Health has implemented an intensive community-based asthma management program.

  • Major decreases in asthma hospitalization rates also occurred in other New York City neighborhoods: by 42.8% in Washington Heights-Inwood; by 41.4% in Crotona-Tremont; by 38.6% in Fordham-Bronx Park; by 36.3% in Williamsburg-Bushwick; by 31.3% in High Bridge-Morrisania; by 25.8% in Central Harlem-Morningside Heights; and by 16.1% in East Harlem.

  • The New York State Department of Health Office of Managed Care reports that, from 1997 to 1998, Medicaid Managed Care plans serving 5-20 year olds with asthma improved by 30% in the use of the preferred medical management. Further, 68% of asthmatic 5-20 year old City residents in Medicaid managed care plans receive the preferred treatment, compared to 60% in the rest of New York State.

    Asthma hospitalization data are based on reports made to the State through its Statewide Planning and Research Cooperative System (SPARCS), and represent numbers of hospitalizations rather than the number of individuals hospitalized.

    The New York City Childhood Asthma Initiative

    The New York City Childhood Asthma Initiative was developed to reduce the burden of asthma in New York City. This innovative program has developed and implemented a range of initiatives Citywide, including:

  • Case management services to assist children with asthma;

  • Working with medical providers, Medicaid managed care organizations, housing organizations, day care centers, schools, and others to improve and better coordinate the care of children with asthma;

  • An education program aimed at improving asthma diagnosis and management practices among physicians;

  • Funding community based organizations to implement a variety of asthma activities in neighborhoods;

  • Health education activities for children with asthma and their families and caregivers;

  • Developing multilingual and educational materials for families;

  • Support for Open Airways for Schools, a school-based curriculum for children with asthma;

  • Training programs for school and afterschool personnel on asthma; and

  • Conferences for nurses, social workers, and other health care professionals on state-of-the-art asthma management.

    The first such program, the Hunts Point Childhood Health Promotion Initiative was piloted in 1997. Following the success of this program, the Health Department funded the development of community-based asthma control programs in several other neighborhoods throughout the City.

    The NYCDOH also conducts asthma surveillance and evaluation activities. These include the collection and analysis of hospital discharge and mortality data and the development of innovative strategies for monitoring emergency department visits and determining asthma prevalence.

    In addition, the NYCDOH has implemented extensive Citywide public awareness activities on asthma, featuring an English and Spanish language asthma poster campaign which has been highly visible throughout the subway system as well as community newspapers and billboards.

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