Browsing by Author "Carr, Thomas"

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    Ensuring Access to Albuterol in Schools: From Policy to Implementation. An Official ATS/AANMA/ALA/NASN Policy Statement
    (American Thoracic Society, 2021) Volerman, Anna; Lowe, Ashley A.; Pappalardo, Andrea A.; Anderson, Charmayne M. C.; Blake, Kathryn V.; Bryant-Stephens, Tyra; Carr, Thomas; Carter, Heather; Cicutto, Lisa; Gerald, Joe K.; Miller, Tina; Moore, Nuala S.; Phan, Hanna; Sadreameli, S. Christy; Tanner, Andrea; Winders, Tonya A.; Gerald, Lynn B.; School of Nursing
    Rationale: For children with asthma, access to quick-relief medications is critical to minimizing morbidity and mortality. An innovative and practical approach to ensure access at school is to maintain a supply of stock albuterol that can be used by any student who experiences respiratory distress. To make this possible, state laws allowing for stock albuterol are needed to improve medication access. Objectives: To provide policy recommendations and outline steps for passing and implementing stock albuterol laws. Methods: We assembled a diverse stakeholder group and reviewed guidelines, literature, statutes, regulations, and implementation documents related to school-based medication access. Stakeholders were divided into two groups—legislation and implementation—on the basis of expertise. Each group met virtually to review documents and draft recommendations. Recommendations were compiled and revised in iterative remote meetings with all stakeholders. Main Results: We offer several recommendations for crafting state legislation and facilitating program implementation. 1) Create a coalition of stakeholders to champion legislation and implement stock albuterol programs. The coalition should include school administrators, school nurses and health personnel, parents, or caregivers of children with asthma, pediatric primary care and subspecialty providers (e.g., pulmonologists/allergists), pharmacists, health department staff, and local/regional/national advocacy organizations. 2) Legislative components critical for effective implementation of stock albuterol programs include specifying that medication can be administered in good faith to any child in respiratory distress, establishing training requirements for school staff, providing immunity from civil liability for staff and prescribers, ensuring pharmacy laws allow prescriptions to be dispensed to schools, and suggesting inhalers with valved holding chambers/spacers for administration. 3) Select an experienced and committed legislator to sponsor legislation and guide revisions as needed during passage and implementation. This person should be from the majority party and serve on the legislature’s health or education committee. 4) Develop plans to disseminate legislation and regulations/policies to affected groups, including school administrators, school nurses, pharmacists, emergency responders, and primary/subspecialty clinicians. Periodically evaluate implementation effectiveness and need for adjustments. Conclusions: Stock albuterol in schools is a safe, practical, and potentially life-saving option for children with asthma, whether asthma is diagnosed or undiagnosed, who lack access to their personal quick-relief medication. Legislation is imperative for aiding in the adoption and implementation of school stock albuterol policies, and key policy inclusions can lay the groundwork for success. Future work should focus on passing legislation in all states, implementing policy in schools, and evaluating the impact of such programs on academic and health outcomes.
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    Policy Recommendations to Eliminate Tobacco Use and Improve Health from the American Thoracic Society Tobacco Action Committee
    (American Thoracic Society, 2022) Eakin, Michelle N.; Bauer, Sarah E.; Carr, Thomas; Dagli, Elif; Ewart, Gary; Garfield, Jamie L.; Jaspers, Ilona; Kher, Sucharita; Leone, Frank T.; Melzer, Anne C.; Moazed, Farzad; Moraes, Theo J.; Reddy, Krishna P.; Upson, Dona; Kathuria, Hasmeena; Pediatrics, School of Medicine
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    Uses of Personal Health Records for Communication Among Colorectal Cancer Survivors, Caregivers, and Providers: Interview and Observational Study in a Human-Computer Interaction Laboratory
    (JMIR, 2022-01-25) Haggstrom, David A.; Carr, Thomas; Medicine, School of Medicine
    Background: Personal health records (PHRs) may be useful for patient self-management and participation in communication with their caregivers and health care providers. As each potential participant's role is different, their perception of the best uses of a PHR may vary. Objective: The perspectives of patients, caregivers, and providers were all evaluated concurrently in relation to a PHR developed for colorectal cancer (CRC) survivors. Methods: We explored group perceptions of a CRC PHR prototype. Scenario-based testing across eight use cases, with semistructured follow-up interviews, was videotaped in a human-computer interaction laboratory with patients, caregivers, and health care providers. Providers included oncologists, gastroenterologists, and primary care physicians. Discrete observations underwent grounded theory visual affinity analysis to identify emergent themes. Results: Observations fell into three major themes: the network (who should be granted access to the PHR by the patient), functions (helpful activities the PHR enabled), and implementation (how to adopt the PHR into workflow). Patients wanted physician access to their PHR, as well as family member access, especially when they lived at a distance. All groups noted the added value of linking the PHR to an electronic health record, self-tracking, self-management, and secure messaging. Patients and caregivers also saw information in the PHR as a useful memory tool given their visits to multiple doctors. Providers had reservations about patients viewing raw data, which they were not prepared to interpret or might be inaccurate; patients and caregivers did not express any reservations about having access to more information. Patients saw PHR communication functions as a potential tool for relationship building. Patients and caregivers valued the journal as a tool for reflection and delivery of emotional support. Providers felt the PHR would facilitate patient-physician communication but worried that sharing journal access would make the doctor-patient relationship less professional and had reservations about the time burden of reviewing. Strategies suggested for efficient adoption into workflow included team delegation. Establishment of parameters for patient uses and provider responses was perceived as good standard practice. Conclusions: PHR perceptions differed by role, with providers seeing the PHR as informational, while patients and caregivers viewed the tool as more relational. Personal health records should be linked to electronic health records for ease of use. Tailoring access, content, and implementation of the PHR is essential. Technology changes have the potential to change the nature of the patient-physician relationship. Patients and providers should establish shared expectations about the optimal use of the PHR and explore how emerging patient-centered technologies can be successfully implemented in modern medical practice to improve the relational quality of care.