Innovative asthma health promotion by rural community pharmacists: a feasibility study

Issue addressed: Asthma awareness in a rural community and the involvement of the community pharmacist in proactive health promotion.

Methods: Between September 2002 and May 2003, seven community pharmacists from Orange, a rural town in New South Wales, were trained to provide two asthma outreach programs: one targeting adolescents in high schools (Year 11 students) using Triple A training; and a public forum on asthma for the wider community.

Results: There was a significant increase in the mean asthma knowledge scores of Year 11 students in each high school after Triple A training. From the multivariate analysis, although there was a significant increase in mean asthma knowledge scores over time (F=101.09, df=1, p< 0.001) there were no differences between high schools (F=2.79, df=2, p> 0.05). There was a significant increase in the proportion of asthma-related pharmacy visits involving requests for information on asthma and on asthma devices at the four different time points.

Conclusions: The study provided a unique opportunity for community pharmacists to increase asthma awareness in a rural setting. The study demonstrated that it is feasible for rural community pharmacists to become involved in proactive health promotion and effectively provide asthma outreach programs.

So what? It is recommended this feasibility study form the basis for future work in demonstrating the effectiveness and sustainability of this model using a randomised controlled design.