Abstract Rationale In 2019, the Global Initiative for Asthma (GINA) introduced a major update to asthma management which recommend the use of inhaled corticosteroids (ICS), rather than short-acting beta-agonists (SABA) alone, as a key component of asthma reliever therapy for individuals of all ages, regardless of asthma severity. Despite the recent shift in global asthma management, prescription rates of ICS-containing reliever therapy (e.g., ICS/SABA or ICS/LABA) following an asthma-related emergency department (ED) visit in adult EDs remain low, yet no studies to date have explored this important issue within pediatric EDs. We aimed to assess the frequency with which pediatric patients receive ICS-containing reliever therapy prescriptions following an asthma-related ED visit in a Chicago-area pediatric ED. Methods We conducted a retrospective analysis of ICS-containing reliever and SABA prescriptions issued after asthma-related encounters in a pediatric emergency department at a Chicago academic medical center among patients ≤17 years of age, from January 1, 2020 through January 1, 2025 (i.e., following the 2019 GINA update). Synthetic data was used through the MDClone ADAMS Platform and included additional demographic data such as patient age, sex, race/ethnicity, and insurance type. Only encounters resulting in ED discharge were analyzed. Descriptive statistics were used for analysis. Results Between 2020-2025, 6245 emergency department asthma encounters were identified. Patients had a median age of 7.6 years, 89.1% self-identified as Black, 79.8% were publicly insured and 58.7% were male. 483 (7.7%) had an ICS-containing medication prescribed following an asthma-related ED visit. In contrast, 1890 (30.3%) had a SABA prescribed. ICS prescribing patterns by year did not reveal any significant differences (p 0.05; Figure 1). Conclusions Despite recent updates to global asthma management, prescription rates for ICS-therapy following asthma-related visits in a Chicago-area pediatric ED remain low, consistent with findings reported in adult EDs. These findings will help guide the development of targeted strategies to address gaps in guideline-based asthma care, particularly within acute care settings serving vulnerable populations. This abstract is funded by: None
Elios et al. (Fri,) studied this question.