- 4.1: Resources for Health Plans, Purchasers, and Policy Specialists
- 4.2: Resources for Providers
- 4.3: Resources for Patients and Families
Our mission:
To reduce the impact of asthma across New England, through collaborations of health, housing, education, and environmental organizations with particular focus on the contribution of schools, homes, and communities to the disease and with attention to its disproportionate impact on populations at greatest risk.
Resources for Health Plans, Purchasers, and Policy Specialists
Highlighted Resources
Insurance Coverage for Asthma: A New England Gap Analysis - December 2010
In order to better understand the extent to which insurance policies in New England reflect and support national guidelines and published research, ARC, in partnership with the CDC-funded asthma programs in the region’s health departments, designed and conducted an insurance coverage survey in the summer of 2010. The survey responses were collected from 25 public (Medicaid) and private (commercial) payers across the six New England states. This report provides a general analysis of the responses and identifies where there are gaps in coverage. With this understanding, ARC and its partners can knowledgably collaborate with public and private health payers to work towards reimbursement policies that will serve to improve health outcomes and simultaneously reduce expensive, preventable, urgent care visits.Investing in Best Practices of Asthma: A Business Case - August 2010 Update This report updates our first Business Case published in 2007. Two primary developments motivated the update. First, the National Asthma Education Prevention Program (NAEPP) Expert Panel, which is responsible for regularly updating the national best practice guidelines for asthma management, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Task Force on Community Preventive Services (CDC Task Force), each published major reviews—including economic evaluations—of the
research on asthma education and environmental interventions. Second, programs translating research on comprehensive asthma management into practice have proliferated. Therefore, in addition to summarizing the NAEPP and the CDC Task Force reviews, this update describes six evidence-based programs which are achieving their goals of bringing asthma under control cost-effectively.
Asthma: A Business Case for Employers and Health Care Purchasers
The report details three strategies employers can pursue to cost-effectively bring asthma under control: 1) Aligning employee health benefits with recommended best practices for asthma; 2) Supporting employees in overcoming barriers to self-management of asthma; and 3) Ensuring healthy work environments. Published by ARC and Lowell Center for Sustainable Production.
Investing in Best Practices for Asthma: A Business Case for Education and Environmental Interventions
Asthma Regional Council, 2007.
Key Research
Quality-of-Life and Cost–Benefit Analysis of a Home Environmental Assessment Program in Connecticut
Connecticut Department of Public Health in Journal of Asthma, 2010.
by the National Center for Healthy Housing and the US CDC, 2009.
How Environmental Exposures Influence the Development and Exacerbation of Asthma.Etzel, R.A., Pediatrics, 2003.
The Seattle-King County Healthy Homes Project: A Randomized, Controlled Trial of a Community Health Worker Intervention to Decrease Exposure to Indoor Asthma Triggers
Krieger et al. American Journal of Public Health, 2005.
Cost-effectiveness of a home-based environmental intervention for inner-city children with asthma.
Kattan et al. Journal of Allergy & Clinical Immunology, 2005.
A Randomized Controlled Trial of Asthma Self-management Support Comparing Clinic-Based Nurses and In-Home Community Health Workers.
Krieger et. al. Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, 2009.
Environmental management of asthma at top-ranked U.S. Managed Care Organizations.
Brugge D, Bagley J, and Hyde J. Journal of Asthma, 2003.Krieger et al. The American Journal of Public Health, 2005.
Guides and Tools for Health Plans
Approaches to Asthma Management: An Assessment of Health Insurance Plans America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), 2005.
Asthma Education Insurance Billing Information: State and Local Guidelines
Provided by the National Asthma Educator Certification Board
Breathing Easier: Asthma Management Programs in Health Plans
AHIP, 2007
Cultivating a Successful Pediatric Asthma Initiative: A Tool Kit for Health Care Organizations
The Alliance of Community Health Plans
Implementing an Asthma Home Visit Program: A Guide to Help Health Plans Get Started
The US Environmental Protection Agency, 2005.
Improving Asthma Care for Children: Best Practices in Medicaid Managed Care
From the Center for Health Care Strategies
Sample Purchasing Specifications for Care of Individuals with Asthma
George Washington University, 2003.
Taking on Asthma: A Resource Guide for Health Insurance Plans
AHIP, 2004.
Expert Panel Report 3: Guidelines for the Diagnosis and Management of Asthma
The National Asthma Education and Prevention Program's (NAEPP) authoritative guidelines for best practices in asthma management.
"Partners Putting Guidelines Into Action"
Guidelines Implementation Panel Report for the NAEPP's Expert Panel Report 3 - Guidelines for the Diagnosis and Management of Asthma
Learn more about exemplary asthma management plans:
Read about the winners of the EPA's National Environmental Leadership Award in Asthma Management
On October 12, 2011 ARC and close to 50 co-signers submitted testimony requesting that the Institute of Medicine examine and address the non-clinical best practice components of comprehensive asthma management as part of Community Based
Non-Clinical Prevention Policies and Wellness Strategies.
Over 50 organizations and individuals joined ARC and Health Resources in Action in expressing to New England U.S. Senator4s our extreme concern about the proposed complete elimination of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Healthy Homes and Lead Poisoning Prevention Program by the Senate Appropriations Committee in the proposed FY12 spending bill for Labor, Health and Human Services and Education.