The goal of this study was to extend and replicate an SMS health intervention for pediatric asthma patients. This intervention was designed using the Health Belief Model (HBM). Thirty patients were randomly assigned to one of three conditions. In the Knowledge condition patients were queried about their asthma knowledge every other day. In the Knowledge and Symptoms condition patients received a daily text message. They were queried about their symptoms and knowledge of asthma on alternate days. The Control group received no texts. Our main finding is that daily text messages lead to improved health outcomes.We explain our results in the context of interview data and the HBM. We conclude by suggesting that the HBM can be used to inform and evaluate system design for chronic care beyond asthma and by considering the role that replication studies can play in HCI research.

Effective communication between health professionals and patients positively influences chronic health management, as does increased patient awareness of their symptoms and general knowledge of the condition. In this study, we leverage the use of mobile phones by pediatric patients and report results from a fourmonth randomized controlled trial (RCT). We examined: 1) how a SMS system impacted the health outcomes of asthmatic children;; and 2) how physicians used a Web service showing the data gathered from the SMS system. Our results show that 1) the simple act of communicating knowledge and symptom awareness information via SMS leads to improved pulmonary function for pediatric patients;; and 2) physicians would use the data sent from the SMS system to monitor asthma management status.

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Asthma is a complex disorder and a leading chronic disease among children in USA. Families and pediatric patients with asthma need to manage different triggers and symptoms.We investigate existing asthma management practices and deploy technology probes to understand how they use technologies to manage asthma. The findings suggest that severity of asthma impacts the way that technologies are utilized. Thus, pervasive computing application can assist families and pediatric patients by bridging gaps between user's needs and their practices based on the severity of asthma and other contextual factors.