Skip to main content

Asthma-Linked Health Care Use Increased With Non-English Speaking Caregivers

Medically reviewed by Carmen Pope, BPharm. Last updated on Nov 15, 2023.

By Elana Gotkine HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, Nov. 15, 2023 -- For pediatric patients with asthma, caregiver non-English language preference (NELP) is associated with increased odds of asthma-related health care utilization, according to a study published online Nov. 15 in Pediatrics.

Mickey Emmanuel, M.D., from the Children's National Hospital in Washington, D.C., and colleagues conducted a retrospective cohort study to examine the role of caregiver language preference on asthma morbidity using data from a registry of pediatric patients (aged 2 to 17 years) with asthma living in the District of Columbia. The primary exposure variable was language preference: self-identified language preference either English preferred or NELP.

Data were included for 14,431 patients; 8.1 percent had NELP. The researchers found that caregiver NELP was associated with increased odds of having an asthma-related emergency department visit, hospitalization, and intensive care unit visit in analyses adjusted for age, sex, ethnicity, insurance status, diagnosis of persistent asthma, controller prescription, and encounter with a primary care provider (adjusted odds ratios, 1.37, 1.79, and 4.37, respectively). Caregiver NELP was associated with increased odds of asthma-related hospitalization among 1,555 participants in the Hispanic subgroup (adjusted odds ratio, 1.73).

"Efforts to reduce unscheduled utilization for families with NELP might focus on understanding the unique barriers that caregivers who speak languages other than English face in caring for their children with asthma, and on delivering linguistically competent asthma care in outpatient and acute-care settings," the authors write.

Abstract/Full Text (subscription or payment may be required)

Disclaimer: Statistical data in medical articles provide general trends and do not pertain to individuals. Individual factors can vary greatly. Always seek personalized medical advice for individual healthcare decisions.

© 2024 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

Posted November 2023

Read this next

Sociodemographics Tied to Rehab Use During Critical Illness Hospitalization

FRIDAY, May 10, 2024 -- For older adults hospitalized with a stay in the intensive care unit (ICU), social determinants of health (SDOH) are associated with use of skilled...

Breakthrough Gene Therapy Enables Infant Born Deaf to Hear

FRIDAY, May 10, 2024 -- Significant hearing improvements have been achieved in an infant with profound hearing loss due to a biallelic otoferlin gene (OTOF) mutation, according to...

Implantable Continuous Flow Device Feasible for Small Children With Severe Systolic Heart Failure

FRIDAY, May 10, 2024 -- The Jarvik 2015 left ventricular assist device (LVAD) seems promising as an implantable continuous flow device for small children with severe systolic...

More news resources

Subscribe to our newsletter

Whatever your topic of interest, subscribe to our newsletters to get the best of Drugs.com in your inbox.