Creating a network of volunteer resources in a psychoeducational family asthma program.

Abstract

This article describes a short-term, preventive intervention with families of children with asthma. The goals of the program include providing information and education, supporting family coping strengths, and networking with helping resources in the community. The described program can serve preventive as well as remedial functions. Such a program could be quite timely in an age of shrinking social service resources since it is based on the creative networking with existing helping resources and volunteers, rather than on the search to find and fund new ones. It is suggested that such a model may be applicable to other illnesses in which family stress factors come into play.