Giving Asthma Support to Patients (GASP) Program Evaluation

Talk Code: 
P1.62
Presenter: 
Nicholas Zwar
Twitter: 
Co-authors: 
Anthony Flynn, Andrew Bonney
Author institutions: 
University of New South Wales, Astthma Australia, University of Wollongong

Problem

Asthma prevalence in Australia is among the highest in the world, affecting over 2 million people. Asthma control is often sub-optimal and it has been a challenge to provide well organised and ongoing asthma care. GASP is an educational program and computerised decision support developed in New Zealand by Comprehensive Care and modified for the Australian context by Asthma Australia. GASP aims to provide practice nurses with skills and knowledge to undertake a structured asthma assessment, provide asthma education and structured follow-up. The objectives of the evaluation are: to assess whether the use of GASP program improves asthma outcomes; and to assess the acceptability, feasibility and sustainability of the GASP program in Australian general practice.

Approach

The program has been implemented in general practices in Western Sydney and the Illawarra and is being evaluated through a pre-post mixed methods design. Quantitative measures include: Pre/post period of treatment, rate of exacerbations, oral steroid use, health service use (unplanned hospital and emergency department attendances, GP visits for asthma). Qualitative evaluation involves semi-structured telephone interviews with a purposive sample of patients, practice nurses and GPs.

Findings

The project is in progress with practices in Western Sydney and Illawarra participating. The poster will report on project progress to date including challenges in practice recruitment, GASP installation in practice computer systems and practice nurse education. The poster will present quantitative findings to date including characteristics and patients recruited and progress of the intervention. Early findings from patient and practice nurse interviews will also be presented.

Consequences

GASP has been a challenging program for general practices to implement as it requires substantial practice nurse training and changes to the practice nurse role. GASP program success essentially depends on practices making fundamental changes to their model of care and providing the space and time for practice nurses to apply the skills and use the tools they have access to via GASP, which provides tailored, evidence-based treatment recommendations and education and self-management support material for their patients with asthma.

Submitted by: 
Nicholas Zwar
Funding acknowledgement: 
Asthma Australia