Study of the Mechanisms of Asthma

Launched by UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO · Jan 15, 2008

Keywords

ClinConnect Summary

Asthma is a common airway disease with persistent unmet needs on terms of treatment. Although many asthmatics enjoy good control of their disease by using regularly scheduled corticosteroid treatment, a significant minority do not achieve optimal control with steroids and suffer asthma exacerbations which can be severe and even fatal. Asthma pathophysiology is complex and involves multiple cell types and multiple signaling mechanisms. One approach to this complexity has been to study responses of isolated airway cells to experimental conditions which model asthmatic inflammation; another ha...

Gender

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Eligibility criteria

• Inclusion Criteria:
• Group C:
• • Male and female subjects between the ages of 18 and 70 years
• • History of asthma
• • Continuous treatment with inhaled corticosteroids for at least the 6-week
• • Hyperreactivity to methacholine (provocative concentration of methacholine causing a 20% drop in forced expiratory volume in 1 second (PC20 FEV1) Methacholine ≤ 16.0 mg/mL).
• Exclusion Criteria:
• • History of asthma
• • No use of oral or inhaled corticosteroids for the treatment of asthma in the past 6 weeks
• • Hyperreactivity to methacholine (PC20 FEV1 Methacholine ≤ 8.0 mg/mL).
• * At least one of the following symptoms, beta agonist use, or FEV1 criteria:
• • Asthma symptoms on at least two days per week; OR
• • Beta agonist use on at least two days per week; OR
• • Forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV1) \< 85% predicted
• • Subjects must be non-smokers (patients who have never smoked or patients who have not smoked for 1 year and have a total pack-year smoking history \< 15 packs).