Community Partners

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Founded in 2013 in memory of Christopher D. Redding, a 3-sport student athlete who died of exercise-induced asthma exacerbation at the age of 18, the mission of the Christopher D. Redding Youth Asthma Foundation (CDRYAF) is to educate, advocate, and provide services for families and youth suffering from asthma, with a focus on lessening the potentially adverse health effects on asthmatic youth and young adults involved in athletics within underserved communities. Since its official launch in May 2015, CDRYAF has collaborated with partners such as Mobile Care Chicago to provide asthma screenings and treatment in underserved neighborhoods, educated community groups, athletic personnel, students and families about asthma, sponsored youth to asthma camps, and provided more than $137,000 in college scholarships and educational grants to outstanding student athletes with asthma.

In 2023, CDRYAF and Mobile Care Chicago collaborated to launch an Asthma and Allergy mobile clinic in Lake County, Illinois. Staffed by asthma and allergy specialists, the Lake County Asthma Van provides no-cost, high-quality, and ongoing asthma and allergy care to youth in Lake County at their schools aboard the asthma van. The program ensures that families without a provider do not have to rely on emergency department visits to treat their child's asthma, or worse, go without treating their asthma at all. This free service, which is provided particularly to youth who are uninsured or on Medicaid, removes many of the barriers to specialized care including costs and transportation barriers.

CDRYAF also works to raise awareness and advocates for change in asthma policies at the city, state, and national level. CDRYAF promotes asthma awareness and care accessibility through working with coalitions and organizations like the Respiratory Health Association, Asthma and Allergy Foundation, Illinois Association of Free and Charitable Clinics and the Chicago Asthma Consortium. In recent years, CDRYAF founders have advocated in Washington D.C. on Capitol Hill for World Asthma Day and engaged with partners and Illinois legislative representatives to improve asthma management policies such as standardized asthma management protocols and stock albuterol to assist asthma exacerbations while students are in school, and to secure funding for free clinics across Illinois.

Respiratory Health Association has been a local public health leader since 1906. At that time, tuberculosis was a prominent health threat in our community. As health practices and treatments, medicines, and environmental factors have evolved, so has RHA. Today we address asthma, COPD, lung cancer, tobacco control and air quality with a comprehensive approach. 

Respiratory Health Association is deeply grateful for the generosity of people, businesses and foundations across Chicagoland and beyond that support our work. Charitable gifts enable us to deliver a sustainable plan for local education, research, and policy change efforts to promote healthy lungs and clean air. Together with our supporters, RHA is addressing challenging issues today as we prepare to face new obstacles in the future. 

Established in 2000 as the research arm of Sinai Chicago, Sinai Urban Health Institute (SUHI) is a unique, nationally-recognized community research center that works in partnership with community members and organizations to identify and address health inequities in some of the most underserved communities in the city. Over the last two decades, we have grown to encompass a diverse staff of approximately 70 epidemiologists, project managers, research assistants, and community health workers, and we have become leaders in the development, implementation, and evaluation of innovative approaches to improve population health – with a primary focus on communities facing financial and social challenges.

The South Side Pediatric Asthma Center (SSPAC) is a multi-institution partnership powered by UChicago Medicine. Our mission is to improve health outcomes for children with asthma by facilitating access to care, promoting standardized treatment and educating through community engagement and outreach.

The Sprague Institute’s work on asthma began before the formation of the CAC with the ALA/RHA helping to advance the concerns about the magnitude of the problem in Chicago. With encouragement from Dr. Whitney Addington, Vicky Persky and Kevin Weiss played important roles in data collection. An early victory was the change in the CPS medication policy that resulted in a change at the State of IL level as well. The network grew and The Institute decided it should be formalized and nurtured. The CAC was one of many Institute grantees that included Ted Naureckas and other researchers at the U of C; community clinics and promotoras projects and interest in the Mobile Care concept. Through my consulting work with the ACCP, I met their staff and Sydney helped replicate the Asthma Consortium concept across the nation at the annual convenings of ACCP members. Those meetings added to greater awareness of the issues and peer sharing of best practices.

The Chicago Asthma Consortium expresses our gratitude to the Illinois Department of Public Health for their continued support over the years.