Purpose: The recurrent COVID-19 epidemic in China has disrupted many aspects of daily life for children with asthma and their caregivers, while negatively impacting their asthma family management models (AFMM). This phenomenological qualitative study identifies what affects the quality of implementation of AFMM in this population and outlines potential coping strategies for the caregivers.
Methods: We used purposive sampling to conduct semistructured interviews with primary caregivers of school-age children with asthma from community healthcare centers (CHCs), which focused on understanding what factors influenced caregivers' implementation of AFMM during quarantine. The Colaizzi seven-step method was used to independently code and categorize the transcript and to generate themes and identify associated key subthemes.
Results: Twenty-four caregivers were interviewed, and they provided greater insight into barriers and motivators to implement AFMM. The three themes and nine relevant subthemes generated, (a) the "individual-family" internal-level factors: weak health literacy and beliefs, quietly changing family relationships, the dramatic increase in the care burden, gradual adjustment of negative psychology; (b) the "hospital-community" external-level factors: the endless power of peer support, strict community quarantine policy; and (c) the "health system-public" social-level factors: the enormous potential of internet-based telemedicine, improved public awareness of prevention, government's prompt assistance.
Conclusions: This qualitative study reveals that the quality of AFMM implementation during pandemic is impacted by three different levels. Therefore, a targeted and comprehensive caring model that provides caregivers with the necessary coping strategies around these three levels is needed to achieve better asthma control outcomes.
Keywords: COVID-19; asthma-related family management model; children; primary caregiver; qualitative study.
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