MESSAGE FROM THE DIRECTOR

Several exciting developments unfolded through the activities of the Alberta Asthma Centre in 2005-2007. Our never-ending commitment to development, testing and implementation of outstanding asthma and allergy education programs for healthcare professionals, patients and their families produced important results. Our research results on poor asthma control in children were published in the Canadian Respiratory Journal and served as an important stimulus for continued work to improve the self-management skills and care of children with asthma. In addition, given our work on innovative asthma education programs, we were invited to write an up-to-date and challenging review in Current Opinions in Pulmonary Medicine of asthma education programs, recent research and a vision to future developments in this area. Our innovative children’s education program, The Roaring Adventures of Puff (RAP), has been successfully used by the Action Plan on Asthma in Ontario and, as with our own study, results are most promising with regard to its impact on children’s self-management skills, healthcare utilization, and in lowering the burden of asthma. The case study of RAP on the Centre for Diseases Control website, Atlanta, Georgia continues to generate interest in the program from various parts of North America and elsewhere.
Given the challenges of the effective and relatively inexpensive dissemination of instructor training and education tools and resources for RAP, we are pleased to have partnered with CLR Media Inc. together with Merck Frosst Canada Inc. in Phase I of making RAP fully available online. This has progressed well and the Phase I has been completed. We have continued to foster broadly-based partnerships and as we have gained experience with RAP and its exposure has increased, we are optimistic that it will be more widely available to those in need. Its innovative content and delivery will foster a broad culture of high quality education programs for asthma and allergies.
RAP is an important component of a broader initiative on helping to create healthy school environments for those with asthma and allergies. We have worked with a variety of stakeholders and in close partnership with an outstanding group of workers in Ontario with a similar focus. Our Ontario colleagues have been most generous in sharing their experience, expertise and resource packages and for that we are most grateful.
Major developments have occurred in the last year with Alberta Health and Wellness, as well as with the Chronic Disease Management Program, Capital Health and a committee associated with Alberta School Boards. We are optimistic that these various initiatives for asthma education programs integrated into the healthcare system, together with asthma and allergy friendly school environments will foster important improvements for those with asthma.
A coalition is evolving with a spectrum of lung interest groups in the province including The Lung Association of the Northwest Territories and Alberta, the COPD and Asthma Network of Alberta (CANA), the Alberta Strategy to Help Manage Asthma and COPD (ASTHMAC) and many others to develop an Alberta Respiratory Health Strategy. We intend that the coming year will see major activities and that we will move forward with Provincial initiatives for healthy schools and foster collaborations across the country, in part through the catalytic activities of the Networks of Centres of Excellence program, AllerGen, and its thematic and programmatic focus on education and social policy developments. Similarly, we hope that the new initiatives in the Capital Health Region and elsewhere in Alberta with chronic disease management programs will provide significant opportunities for the Alberta Asthma Centre to help reduce the health, social and economic burden of asthma in the province.
We are pleased that we have been able to partner with two other major organizations in the Province, namely the COPD and Asthma Network of Alberta (CANA) and the Alberta Strategy to Help Manage Asthma and COPD (ASTHMAC). It is increasingly important that the various organizations that share so many common objectives, work together to integrate programs in the most appropriate way. It is also critically important that the various organizations work together with long-term strategic planning to foster partnerships, collaborations and infrastructure to help achieve best lung health for all of those in the Province. Pulmonary specialists, allergists, pediatricians and family physicians must work with the tremendous spectrum of allied health care professionals and scientists to advance this agenda. The Centre looks forward to being an important part of these initiatives.
I am particularly pleased with the outstanding contributions of the Pediatric and Adult Divisions of Respiratory Medicine at the University of Alberta. Each of the Divisions has had significant growth and has recruited outstanding respiratory specialists. The Alberta Asthma Centre Asthma Clinic has evolved under the leadership of Drs. Dilini Vethanagayam, Harissios Vliagoftis and Irvin Mayers with tremendous support from the Nurse Educator, Cindy O’Hara, and several others (see below). In addition, under the leadership of Dr. Mayers the University of Alberta has been identified as one of five clinical investigation sites in Canada that together represent the clinical investigation collaborative within the AllerGen NCE Inc. Network in Canada. This is a tremendous opportunity for cutting edge research initiatives and clinical investigation. It will provide infrastructure support and attract other outstanding opportunities for advances in clinical research to enhance patient care and advance our understanding of the fundamental basis of asthma and other allergic diseases.
Lastly, I would like to thank the staff of the Centre and the numerous professionals that we have had the privilege of working with, together with the tremendous group of volunteers that share our vision and provide such unselfish commitments to help us.
Capital Health has generously provided space for the Centre. The Childhood Asthma Foundation of Canada provided a generous donation to help us with our mandate. Ashley Smith and her many energetic and enthusiastic colleagues have been an inspiration and help support the Centre in so many ways. We are looking forward to an exciting 2007-2008 and to fulfilling the vision that patients, their healthcare partners, family and other caregivers will be well educated and fully prepared to help in the management partnership that leads to living a normal life despite a diagnosis of asthma.
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Dean Befus, PhD
Director, Alberta Asthma Centre
March 31, 2007