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Asthma Attacks Among Persons with Current Asthma — United States, 2001–2010

	Supplement Volume 62, Supplement, No. 3 November 22, 2013 PDF of this issue

Asthma Attacks Among Persons with Current Asthma — United States, 2001–2010

Supplements

November 22, 2013 / 62(03);93-98

Jeanne E. Moorman, MS

Cara J. Person, MPH

Hatice S. Zahran, MD

Division of Environmental Hazards and Health Effects, National Center for Environmental Health, CDC

Corresponding author: Jeanne Moorman, Division of Environmental Hazards and Health Effects, National Center for Environmental Health, CDC. Telephone: 770-488-3726; E-mail: zva9@cdc.gov.

Introduction

Asthma is a chronic inflammatory disorder of the airways that is characterized by episodic and reversible airflow obstruction, airway hyper-responsiveness, and underlying inflammation. Common asthma symptoms include wheezing, coughing, and shortness of breath (1). With correct treatment and avoidance of exposure to environmental allergens and irritants that are known to exacerbate asthma, the majority of persons who have asthma can expect to achieve optimal symptom control (2).
Multiple reports published previously provide detailed surveillance information on asthma (1,3–8). A 1987 report that included asthma surveillance data for 1965–1984 identified differences among certain demographic groups by age, sex, and race/ethnicity (5). Subsequent asthma surveillance reports confirmed these differences and documented that the differences have persisted over time (1,3,4,6). These reports indicate that population-based asthma prevalence rates, emergency department visit rates, and hospitalization rates were higher among blacks than among whites, higher among females than among males, higher among children (aged 0–17 years) than among adults (aged ≥18 years), and higher among males aged 0–17 years than among females in the same age group. In addition, more detailed analysis of ethnicity data demonstrated that asthma health outcomes differed among Hispanic groups. Hispanics of Puerto Rican descent (origin or ancestry) had higher asthma prevalence and death rates than other Hispanics (e.g., Hispanics of Mexican descent), non-Hispanic blacks, and non-Hispanic whites (7,8).
Current asthma prevalence rates among the demographic groups for the years covered in this report were similar to those in previous CDC reports (1,3,4,6). During 2006–2010, an estimated 8.0% of the U.S. population had current asthma. Asthma prevalence varied by demographic group: 6.9% among males, 9.0% among females, 9.4% among children, 7.6% among adults, 7.9% among whites, 10.5% among blacks, 10.8% among American Indians/Alaska Natives, 5.0% among Asians, 14.4% among multi-race/other-race persons, 15.9% among Puerto Ricans, and 5.4% among Mexicans.
This report is part of the second CDC Health Disparities and Inequalities Report (CHDIR). The 2011 CHDIR (9) was the first CDC report to assess disparities across a wide range of diseases, behavior risk factors, environmental exposures, social determinants, and health-care access. The topic presented in this report is based on criteria that are described in the 2013 CHDIR Introduction (10). This report provides information regarding asthma attacks among persons with current asthma that supplements information about current asthma prevalence provided in the 2011 CHDIR (4). The purposes of this report are to discuss and raise awareness of differences in asthma attacks among persons with current asthma and to prompt actions to reduce these disparities.