When your Child has asthma or other Respitary Challenges Its Life Critical

Sometimes the simple things are the most glaring omissions. This Saturday I had an appointment to discuss the installation of some revolutionary new HVAC equipment in a high end North Shore Long Island town home community. The owner is a very busy head of Finance for a sizable company in the New York area. He has a middle school age son who has suffered from severe asthma since infancy. They have owned this home for almost 3 years. 18 months ago they hired an old and established big box home services company to clean the ducts on both of their HVAC systems. You would think the big box store after cleaning the ducts would have installed air filters in the returns. My Saturday visit was the 3rd estimate in the past 3 weeks for a complete replacement of their 2 systems. Not one of the companies that did the duct cleaning or the representatives for the other 2 contractors, noticed the single most glaring deficiency in this Homeowners indoor air quality. There are no filters in the living area return grilles or the furnace returns. The homeowners son's asthma is so severe, any time he gets sick his throat completely closes up. As a homeowner you need to know what you need to know. In any climate you need proper indoor air filtration and in colder climates, you need the proper level of relative humidity. Given the number of children today with chronic respiratory diseases, indoor air quality is truly a life critical issue. There is no defense for being naive. Ask the contractors the right questions. If they don't know the answers change contractors. Its your family's life.