OBJECTIVES During or after surgery, asthma attacks due to airway hyperresponsiveness (AHR) are likely to occur in patients with bronchial asthma. Preoperative administration of corticosteroid for prevention of perioperative asthma attacks is useful. We examined the mechanism of prevention of perioperative asthma attacks by the preoperative administration of corticosteroid in vitro. DESIGN Fiv...

Long-acting inhaled beta2-agonists and inhaled corticosteroids are classes of drugs with different mechanisms of action that are commonly used to provide effective long-term control of persistent asthma. Scientific and clinical data support the complementary mechanisms of action of the inhaled corticosteroids and the long-acting beta2-agonists in achieving a superior level of asthma control. In...

Insufficient use of anti-inflammatory drugs, such as inhaled corticosteroids and cromoglycate, may contribute to the disease burden associated with asthma. Conversely, aggressive treatment of mild disease may result in avoidable costs and/or adverse drug effects. The aim of this study was to determine the relationship between asthma severity and inhaled corticosteroid/cromoglycate use in a larg...

BACKGROUND Identification of patients at risk for asthma exacerbations can assist physicians in addressing disease management and improve asthma-related health outcomes. OBJECTIVE We sought to evaluate whether level of impairment, as defined by the 2007 asthma guidelines, predicts risk for future asthma exacerbations. METHODS The study included children aged 6 to 11 years (n = 82) and adole...

OBJECTIVES The primary aims of the study were to: (a) describe the trajectories of adherence to daily inhaled corticosteroid (ICS) medication for a year in economically disadvantaged, African-American youth with asthma based on growth curve modeling; and (b) test the relationship of treatment adherence to symptom control, quick-relief medication, and healthcare utilization. METHODS This prosp...

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is characterized in part by a chronic inflammatory state in the airways (largely from chronic noxious stimuli such as tobacco smoke), punctuated with acute inflammatory exacerbations, which are often infectious. Although pathologically and biochemically different from the inflammation of asthma, the chronic inflammation of chronic obstructive pulmonary dise...

background: about 5–10% of patients with asthma suffer from poorly-controlled disease despite corticosteroid (cs) therapy. methods: 21 severe and 30 mild asthma patients were recruited and underwent collection of blood sample. we determined whether there were any differences in inflammatory biomarkers between severe and mild asthma patients or not.results: levels of interleukin-8 (il-8) and int...

In this study, we sought to determine whether asthma has a metabolic profile and whether this profile is related to disease severity.We characterised the serum from 22 healthy individuals and 54 asthmatics (12 mild, 20 moderate, 22 severe) using liquid chromatography-high-resolution mass spectrometry-based metabolomics. Selected metabolites were confirmed by targeted mass spectrometry assays of...

BACKGROUND Atopic asthma is characterized by Th2 cytokine-driven inflammation of the airway mucosa, which is signaled by the fraction of exhaled nitric oxide (FENO). OBJECTIVE We tested whether an FENO-guided anti-inflammatory treatment algorithm could improve asthma-related quality of life and asthma symptom control, and reduce exacerbations in atopic asthmatics within primary care. METHOD...

CD4+CD25+high Foxp3 regulatory T (Treg) cells are known to play a key role in balancing immune response to maintain peripheral tolerance against harmless antigens or allergens. Defective immunological suppression by CD4+CD25+high Foxp3 Treg cells can be a cause of the inflammation that leads to an allergic condition such as asthma. The aims of the study are to (1) determine CD4+CD25+high Foxp3 ...