This supplemental project to an existing grant enhances a mobile health intervention for home monitoring of asthma symptoms with COVID-19 symptom screening.
What Is the Research About?
People living with asthma faced new and daunting risks during the COVID-19 pandemic. First, the potential respiratory complications of a COVID-19 infection can be especially dangerous for people living with asthma. In addition, getting routine care and filling prescriptions to manage a chronic condition became more difficult during the pandemic.
In their primary AHRQ grant, this research team is scaling a mobile health (mHealth) intervention to collect and monitor asthma symptoms between primary care visits. This intervention includes the use of a mHealth app through which patients regularly report their asthma symptoms.
The intervention also includes a corresponding model to help clinics routinely monitor the patient-reported outcomes collected via the app.
For this COVID supplemental grant, the research team is enhancing the mHealth app to include screening for COVID-19 symptoms and to disseminate COVID-19 related health information to patients. In addition, the team worked to identify how to most effectively recruit patients to participate in the mHealth intervention during the pandemic. Finally, the team is using electronic health record data to identify which patients are most likely to benefit from home monitoring of asthma symptoms.
Results from this study are forthcoming. Current and future publications from this grant will be posted here.
Primary Care Relevance
This study will help build an understanding about how to use mobile health technology to keep patients with chronic conditions safe and minimize strain on critical care capacity during future COVID-19 surges or similar events.
AHRQ Primary Care Priority Area
Research to improve primary care, including regarding quality, access and affordability, the workforce, care delivery models, financing, digital healthcare, person-centeredness, and health equity.
