Skip Navigation
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences

Use this QR code to view the newest version of this document
Use this QR code to view the newest version of this document

Your Environment. Your Health.

Publication Detail

Title: Physical activity and asthma symptoms among New York City Head Start Children.

Authors: Rundle, Andrew; Goldstein, Inge F; Mellins, Robert B; Ashby-Thompson, Maxine; Hoepner, Lori; Jacobson, Judith S

Published In J Asthma, (2009 Oct)

Abstract: The coincidence of both an obesity epidemic and an asthma epidemic among children in the United States has suggested that childhood overweight and sedentary lifestyles may be risk factors for asthma development. We therefore conducted a study of those factors among children enrolled in Head Start Centers located in areas of New York City with high asthma hospitalization rates. Data were gathered from 547 children through an intensive home visit, and physical activity was measured on 463 children using the Actiwatch accelerometer. Data on allergy and asthma symptoms and demographic variables were obtained from parents' responses to a questionnaire and complete data were available from 433 children. Overall physical activity was highest in warmer months, among boys, among children whose mothers did not work or attend school, and among children of mothers born in the United States. Activity was also positively associated with the number of rooms in the home. The season in which the activity data were collected modified many of the associations between demographic predictor variables and activity levels. Nearly half the children were above the range considered healthy weight. In cross-sectional analyses, before and after control for demographic correlates of physical activity, asthma symptoms were not associated with physical activity in this age group. Comparing the highest quartile of activity to the lowest, the odds ratio for asthma was 0.91 (95% CI = 0.46, 1.80). However, the novel associations with physical activity that we have observed may be relevant to the obesity epidemic and useful for planning interventions to increase physical activity among preschool children living in cities in the northern United States.

PubMed ID: 19863284 Exiting the NIEHS site

MeSH Terms: Adult; Anthropometry; Asthma/epidemiology; Asthma/immunology*; Child, Preschool; Cohort Studies; Cross-Sectional Studies; Early Intervention (Education); Female; Humans; Hypersensitivity/epidemiology; Hypersensitivity/immunology*; Linear Models; Male; Motor Activity/immunology*; Multivariate Analysis; New York City/epidemiology; Questionnaires; Seasons; Socioeconomic Factors

Back
to Top