Welcome to the Asthma Management website.  The site now contains details of all projects that have been recommended for funding by the Asthma Programme's Commissioning Group.  There have been two calls for proposals for the NHS National R&D Programme on Asthma Management and a total of 29 projects have been commissioned to date with a further 5 projects either in contract negotiation or under consideration. October 1999 saw two new projects commissioned:

• An exploration of patient, parent and professional knowledge, beliefs and behaviour regarding the contribution of allergen avoidance in the management of asthma
  
• Health beliefs, behaviour and goals of professional health carers and adolescents with asthma: exploring and matching perspectives for improving concordance with self-management

A workshop for the programme's researchers and commissioning group members was held on the 7th June 1999.  Information about the Asthma Programme and Issue 1 of the Asthma Management Programme newsletter is available from Debbie Carnell.

The Research Manager, Philip Green, will be moving on to pastures new from December 1999.  Debbie Carnell will be able to deal with any enquiries you may have from this date.

'What's New' will keep you up to date with additions and changes to items on the Web site. It is not a definitive guide to everything new in R&D! Other places to find updates to the R&D programme are the web sites of the Department of Health, other National R&D Priority Programmes and Regional Office R&D Directorates.