NATIONAL ASTHMA EDUCATION PROGRAMME
(NAEP)
NAEP in the Western Cape
NAEP was founded in South Africa in 1994 by Drs Mike Greenblatt, David Luyt and Robin Green, and up until recently it was functioning only in Gauteng. In April 1996, regional representatives were elected to the National Committee in order to disseminate its message throughout the country.
The Western Cape regional representatives are Dr Alwyn Foden (a pulmonologist in private practice) and Dr Gillian Ainslie (a pulmonologist in provincial/university practice). A local committee has been formed consisting of 2 GPs (Saville Furman, also a representative from the Academy of Family Practice, and Martie Duvenage, who has had experience with the British National Asthma Campaign), 2 paediatricians (Jan Vermeulen from private practice, and Sharon Kling from Tygerberg Hospital, and on the Allergy Society executive), a doctor working in the Community Health Centres (Bob Mash), a pharmacist (James Syce from University of the Western Cape), a nursing sister (Ann Toerien from Red Cross Hosp Allergy Clinic) and a clinical technologist (Dilys Berman, also from Red Cross Allergy Clinic).
This gives a wide spectrum of role players with different perspectives. Our aim is to spread the NAEP message in the Western Cape. We endorse the sets of Guidelines brought out by the South African Pulmonology Society (SAPS) and the Allergy Society of South Africa (ALLSA) for the treatment of both acute and chronic asthma in adults and children. We will be setting up asthma education programmes, based on these guidelines, aimed both at health professionals, and the general public.
We hope to co-ordinate asthma education for health professionals. We are setting up a database of primary care doctors (both in private practice and the community health centres), general physicians, paediatricians and pulmonologists in the Western Cape. They will be invited to become NAEP members, and informed of any NAEP-related functions and programmes.
We have also set up a database of all activities in the Western Cape related to asthma education, so that we can see what we are achieving, prevent duplication of effort,and pick up any gaps (in both subjects addressed and geographic areas targeted). We are planning lectures and workshops in the evenings, as well as during the day in practice rooms, clinics and community health centres. These have been generously supported by the pharmaceutical industry, including 3M, Glaxo and Boehringer Ingelheim.
In these, we will encourage the active involvement of patients in their asthma care, and the following of the published asthma treatment guidelines, with the use of peak flow meters, diary cards and action plans. We have drawn up a list of NAEP-associated doctors who are willing to give talks, and help run workshops. We have also drawn up a suggested list of asthma-related topics for talks and discussion groups. However, I would like to really stress that these are just suggestions, and we want the programme to be driven by the needs of individual communities, ie. primary care doctors, nurses and pharmacists asking us to help them with projects they and their patients feel they need, rather than us telling them, what we think they need.
We would like to develop a widespread network covering the Western Cape of active NAEP members among primary care heath professionals, who will ensure that their local community is getting the best and most up-to date information about asthma care. We are concentrating on the Cape Metro area initially, but later hope to spread out to the other 3 health regions (West Coast, Boland/Overberg, and Southern Cape/Karoo).
We would welcome contact from any enthusiastic health professionals from these areas, who, with our help, would be prepared to drive community-based asthma education programmes. We will continue to support and expand upon the Glaxo Care Asthma Workshops which are training nursing sisters from the community health centres, primary health care system, occupational health and the private hospitals. We hope to also involve nurses from rural clinics, and community health workers elected from the local communities themselves.
As far as the general public are concerned, we are running the following:
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- a schools’ education programme (sponsored by Astra)
- information stands in various shopping malls (sponsored by Novartis),
- public meetings where asthma sufferers and their relatives can discuss their problems with a panel of experts
- articles in the mainstream and community press
- asthma phone-in talk shows on local community radio.
We will encourage asthma sufferers and their families to become NAEP members, as one of our primary goals is to try and get both patients and the public more involved in the running of NAEP. Our long-term hope is that we can turn over control to them in the future, leaving us with an advisory role only.
NAEP currently provides an asthma education leaflet, as well as diary cards and action plan cards. Many more brochures on various asthma-related topics will soon be available. We are working with the National Progressive Primary Health Care Network (NPPHCN) Media Centre in Observatory to both translate these and develop other educational material into Xhosa and Afrikaans. It is important that leaflets, diary cards and action plans be in the local languages, and be presented in terms that are simple, accessible and culturally acceptable.
The currently available leaflets, action plans and diary cards may be obtained from our new local office, which is kindly housed at:
ALLSA Head Office
Suite 3A,
First Floor,
Waverley Court,
25-27 Kotzee Rd,
Mowbray 7700
Tel 47-9019; Fax 448-0846
(or PO Box 88, Observatory 7935).
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