Epidemiology of asthma in children. Who gets asthma and why?
BACKGROUND
Asthma is a common disease in childhood which results in a substantial burden of illness in Australia. This is manifest by distressing symptoms, impact on quality of life and role performance and health service utilisation.


OBJECTIVE
This article reviews the current literature on the epidemiology of asthma in children. It particularly focuses on the prevalence, trends in prevalence, risk factors and causes of asthma. The emphasis is on common questions that parents of children with asthma would like answered by their general practitioners.


CONCLUSIONS
We know something about some of the risk factors for asthma and a little about the mechanisms for the development of asthma. Despite the paucity of knowledge about the causes of asthma, some positive steps can be taken to prevent it. Allergic or asthmatic parents, whose children have a high risk of developing asthma, can be advised to avoid smoking during pregnancy and avoid environmental tobacco smoke exposure after the child is born, to undertake house dust mite control strategies, to breastfeed their babies for at least three months and subsequently to provide their child with a nutritious, balanced diet.
Epidemiology Unit Liverpool Hospital, South Western Sydney Area Health Service. b.jalaludin@unsw.edu.au
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Marks
D001249:Asthma / Q000453:epidemiology*; D001315:Australia / Q000453:epidemiology; D002648:Child; D006801:Humans; D015995:Prevalence; D012307:Risk Factors