Asthma accounts for more absences from school than any other chronic illness and is a leading cause of visits to the doctor’s office. It is a serious disease—the rate of death from asthma is under l percent among hospitalized children, but it rises to 2 to 4 percent among adults.
Until approximately 10 years ago, asthma was defined as spastic airways or repetitive contractions of bronchial smooth muscle. A major development was the appreciation that a better definition of asthma was hyperreactive or spastic airways with inflammation. In fact, it was convincingly demonstrated that the severity of asthma correlated with the concentration of inflammatory products in the bronchial fluid of patients with asthma. In this regard, one of the most important advances in the treatment of asthma was the introduction of inhaled, or topical, steroids as first-line drugs. Before discussing inhaled steroids, I will put their role into perspective by briefly discussing the roles of other medications in the treatment of asthma.
Effective treatment of asthma entails the following four steps (not all of which are applicable to everyone):
1-Identification of causal agents
2-Avoidance of causal agents
3-Control of appearance of symptoms through medication and other strategies
4-Treatment of symptoms
There are several medications available that keep asthma symptoms from appearing or relieve them when they are present. These medications are beta-agonists, theophyllines, cromolyn sodium, leukotriene inhibitors, and corticosteroids. Except for a few over-the-counter beta-agonists, these are all prescription drugs.
beta-agonists
theophyllines
Until approximately 10 years ago, asthma was defined as spastic airways or repetitive contractions of bronchial smooth muscle. A major development was the appreciation that a better definition of asthma was hyperreactive or spastic airways with inflammation. In fact, it was convincingly demonstrated that the severity of asthma correlated with the concentration of inflammatory products in the bronchial fluid of patients with asthma. In this regard, one of the most important advances in the treatment of asthma was the introduction of inhaled, or topical, steroids as first-line drugs. Before discussing inhaled steroids, I will put their role into perspective by briefly discussing the roles of other medications in the treatment of asthma.
Effective treatment of asthma entails the following four steps (not all of which are applicable to everyone):
1-Identification of causal agents
2-Avoidance of causal agents
3-Control of appearance of symptoms through medication and other strategies
4-Treatment of symptoms
There are several medications available that keep asthma symptoms from appearing or relieve them when they are present. These medications are beta-agonists, theophyllines, cromolyn sodium, leukotriene inhibitors, and corticosteroids. Except for a few over-the-counter beta-agonists, these are all prescription drugs.
beta-agonists
theophyllines
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