We studied, whether asthma diagnosed in childhood or early adulthood affects work ability 20 years later. We used Finnish Defence Force registers, 1986-1990, to select: (1) conscripts with asthma to represent a mild/moderate asthma group (n=485), (2) asthmatics who were exempted from military service to represent a relatively severe asthma group (n=393) and (3) a control group (n 1500) without ...

The severity of asthma can be graded from mild intermittent to severe persistent. Airway inflammation is a feature of persistent asthma. We compared several markers of inflammation in mucosal biopsies and bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BAL fluid) from 12 healthy control subjects, 24 patients with intermittent asthma, and 18 patients with mild-to-moderate persistent asthma. Epithelial shedding, e...

Asthma is a chronic airway inflammation with a potential systemic impact. Atherosclerosis is a chronic inflammatory artery disease. The aim of our study was to prove if there is a correlation between the occurrence of asthma and increased atherosclerotic vessel disorders. Vessel status was compared between mild-to-moderate, severe allergic asthma and matched controls. Measurements of artery sti...

Background—Asthma exacerbations contribute substantially to morbidity, and their reduction is an important therapeutic objective. In this integrated analysis the risk of asthma exacerbations was assessed during treatment with the leukotriene receptor antagonist zafirlukast. Methods—Data were collected from all five double blind, multicentre, randomised, placebo controlled, 13 week trials of zaf...

BACKGROUND Although allergy is known to play an important role in the development of asthma, its influence on the severity of the disease remains under discussion. OBJECTIVE The aim of our study was to examine the relationship between asthma severity and intensity of atopy in adult female asthmatic patients. METHODS One hundred two consecutive female patients (mean [SD] age, 51.7 [13.4] yea...

Background: Several studies have shown links between the upper and lower airways in allergic patients. Objectives: This study aimed to evaluate the prevalence of rhinitis in patients with allergic asthma attending allergy outpatient clinics and to examine the interrelationship between both conditions. Methods: An epidemiological prospective study was carried out during the period 2004-2005 and ...

BACKGROUND Asthma is a biologically heterogeneous disease and development of novel therapeutics requires understanding of pathophysiologic phenotypes. There is uncertainty regarding the stability of clinical characteristics and biomarkers in asthma over time. This report presents the longitudinal stability over 12 months of clinical characteristics and clinically accessible biomarkers from ADEP...

Under the auspices of Russian Association Allergists and Clinical Immunologists Pediatric Respiratory Society, an expert meeting "Leukotriene receptor antagonists in treatment bronchial asthma" was held. Asthma is a common non-communicable chronic disorder airways characterized by variable recurring symptoms, airflow obstruction, hyperresponsiveness, underlying inflammation. The creation widesp...

BACKGROUND Exercise-induced bronchoconstriction (EIB), which describes acute airway narrowing that occurs as a result of exercise, is associated with eosinophilic airway inflammation, bronchial hyperresponsiveness. The forced expiratory volume in one second (FEV1) is the most commonly used spirometric test in the diagnosis of EIB in exercise challenge in asthma. Other parameters such as forced ...

Local airway water loss is the main physiological trigger for exercise-induced bronchoconstriction (EIB). Our aim was to investigate the effects of whole body water loss on airway responsiveness and pulmonary function in athletes with mild asthma and/or EIB. Ten recreational athletes with a medical diagnosis of mild asthma and/or EIB completed a randomized, crossover study. Pulmonary function t...