Despite improved medical treatments, asthma morbidity rates have continued to climb. Individual and family psychological factors have consistently been implicated in this increase, but little research has examined how family history interacts with asthma in producing psychological symptoms. The proposed research seeks to apply a trauma model to better understand the impact of pediatric asthma on parent and child psychological adjustment and to explore how the presence of posttraumatic stress symptoms impacts asthma morbidity. It is hypothesized that parents with a history of trauma exposure will be more traumatized by their child?s asthma and that these trauma symptoms will interfere with the child?s psychological adjustment and with successful illness management. The proposed project will examine the prevalence of past traumatic events and current post-traumatic symptomatology in asthmatic and control adolescents and their parents and study the link between trauma and poor asthma outcomes as mediated by medication non-adherence and poor perception of symptoms. Three groups of adolescents and parents will participate: 1) asthmatics who have had a life threatening episode; 2) asthmatics who have not had a life threatening episode; and 3) healthy controls. Results will address the potential of childhood asthma to traumatize vulnerable family members and will identify ways in which psychological functioning and asthma management strategies interact in producing increased asthma morbidity.
| Kean, Emily Millikan; Kelsay, Kimberly; Wamboldt, Frederick et al. (2006) Posttraumatic stress in adolescents with asthma and their parents. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry 45:78-86 |
