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Spectrum of asthma in children. II. Allergic components
Insights
Children with asthma exhibit more allergic symptoms than non-asthmatic children. A combination of allergic features, rather than a single one, distinguished asthmatics, with severity correlating to asthma persistence.
Area of Science:
- Pediatric Allergy and Immunology
- Respiratory Medicine
Background:
- Asthma is a complex respiratory condition with potential links to allergic states.
- Understanding the relationship between allergic manifestations and asthma severity in children is crucial for effective management.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the incidence of various clinical and immunological allergic features in children with different grades of asthma.
- To compare these features with a control group of non-asthmatic children.
- To identify differentiating characteristics of allergic states in asthmatic children.
Main Methods:
- Longitudinal study tracking children at ages 7, 10, and 14.
- Inclusion of four grades of asthma, from mild to severe.
- Comparison with a control group of non-asthmatic children.
Main Results:
- Asthmatic children showed a significantly higher incidence of all studied allergic features.
- No single allergic feature definitively distinguished asthmatics from controls.
- A cluster of allergic features characterized asthmatics, with greater manifestations linked to more severe, persistent asthma.
Conclusions:
- Allergic manifestations are prevalent in childhood asthma, with a combined presence being a key differentiator.
- The relationship between asthma's clinical course and the onset/variation of allergic symptoms requires further investigation.
- The mechanisms linking non-allergic triggers to asthma attacks and their relation to allergy remain largely unknown.
Abstract:
The incidence of a variety of clinical and immunological features of an allergic state was studied at 7, 10, and 14 years of age in a group of children suffering from one of four grades of asthma, ranging from mild subclinical to severe unremitting, and compared with the incidence in a control group of non-asthmatic children. The incidence of all features of allergy was significantly higher in the asthmatics but no one feature unequivocally distinguished the asthmatics from the controls. Almost all the asthmatics showed several features of the allergic state at 14 years of age. A cluster of allergic features was a differentiating characteristic of the asthmatics, and the children with the most allergic manifestations were usually the children with the most severe and persistent asthma. The first appearance of and subsequent variation in some of the allergic manifestations often did not correspond to the clinical course of the asthma.Though many manifestations of asthma can be understood on an allergic basis the mechanism by which emotional disturbance, exercise, viral infections, and non-allergenic stimuli precipitate attacks of asthma and the relation of these factors to allergy are unknown.