Bringing the clinic to you

DaQuan Holbrook, 9, knows this, but his mind is more often on football or playing computer games. He is about to enter the fourth grade at Ludwig Elementary School in Baltimore, but DaQuan?s mother, Stephanie Mitchell, doesn?t want him playing ball if he’s not going to look after his asthma.

“His father is a coach and his uncle is a coach, and he won?t tell them when he?s having a problem,” she says. “He wants to push himself.”

“We want you to play football like all the other kids,” nurse Melissa Streett tells him in a cozy exam room on the Breathmobile ? an RV outfitted by the University of Maryland Hospital for Children as a mobile asthma clinic. “You could be the next Ray Lewis.”

DaQuan smiles at the thought of being compared to the Ravens linebacker.

“You?re going to have to get your asthma under control first,” Streett continues.

Though the boys have to walk through 90-degree heat and Code Red air quality to get to the bus, the message hits home.

DaQuan?s older brother, Corey Jones, 12, says he will look after his brother and make sure he takes his inhaler medication daily and as needed for emergencies.

Corey also suffers from asthma, but fortunately he hasn’t had to use his emergency inhaler much this year. “I give it to my mom. When I get tired, I goover and get it. If I need it, I stay close to the house.”

The Breathmobile visits schools and recreation centers to screen, test and treat children for asthma and allergies. The bus is supported by grants and donations, and its medical staff charges nothing for treatment.

“If kids take their medications, we give them a reward,” says Breathmobile program director Michelle Foster. Freebies include pencils with decorative erasers, books and even a computer action game with an asthma theme.

DaQuan prefers the Breathmobile to a doctor’s office. “I don?t like going into that room and getting up on that stretcher thing,” he says.

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