Development of a Clean Air Room for Urban Early Childhood Development Centers

Abstract

Fine particulate matters (PM2.5) in Bangkok and other urban areas have been increasing, posing direct health impacts on vulnerable populations, particularly among early childhood children. Development of a clean air room aimed to design and improve a clean air room in an early childhood development center at the Urban Health Development Institute to reduce and prevent health impacts from PM2.5 exposures. The development process included: 1) planning and site selection based on standard criteria; 2) environmental improvement to reduce sources of particulate matter both indoors and outdoors; 3) installation of air purification systems and air quality monitoring devices; 4) provision of training and knowledge dissemination for teachers, caregivers, and parents; and 5) evaluation through PM2.5 measurements, knowledge assessment, and child health surveillance.

The results showed that: 1) participants’ post-training knowledge scores (=13.17, SD=1.71) were significantly higher than the pre-training (=10.04, SD=1.81) at p=0.05; 2) most participants reported high to very high satisfaction, with the highest level of overall satisfaction (68.4%); 3) the mean indoor PM2.5 concentration decreased markedly from 15.5 µg/m³ to 4.2 µg/m³ after the clean air room improvement; and 4) prevalence of PM-related symptoms decreased from 40.2% to 38.2% within one month, and decreased from 34.0% to 31.0% within one week. In addition, the rates of physician visits and medical leave following medical advice decreased by 10.2%.