Active clinical trials for "Asthma"

Asthma is a disease characterized by inflammation in the airways. The body naturally makes compounds that reduce inflammation. Unfortunately, for patients with severe asthma, the pathway these compounds use to reduce inflammation seems to be perturbed. Investigators have chosen to focus on the anti-inflammatory compounds called lipoxins and how they work through the "ALX Axis", a name given to the ALX receptor pathway and its ligands. Work from the Brigham and Women's Hospital has suggested that in patients with severe asthma, the ALX axis may not work properly and therefore may not shut off inflammation as expected. Also, there is information to suggest that in some cases, steroids (prednisone and similar drugs), which are commonly used to treat asthma, may affect the ALX axis in a negative way, paradoxically making the inflammation worse instead of better. As part of the NIH Severe Asthma Research Program the Asthma Research Center's goal is to identify what causes the problems in the ALX axis in severe asthma. To do so, participants with severe asthma will be compared to participants with milder forms of asthma. Investigators will use samples taken directly from the lungs of people with asthma, as well as blood, urine and CT scans of the lungs to better understand how the ALX axis changes both before and after corticosteroid treatment and throughout a three year span. Participants will come into the Asthma Research Center to have the procedures done. Investigators expect participants will perform breathing tests and complete questionnaires and diaries. To better understand if corticosteroids negatively affect the ALX axis in severe asthma, researchers will take samples before and after a one time steroid injection equivalent to a prednisone treatment for asthma. Participants will perform two bronchoscopy procedures, before and after corticosteroid treatment, where biopsies and cells will be obtained from the participant's lungs. Investigators will use these samples to observe any changes that the corticosteroid may have on the ALX axis. At the end of the study, researchers at the Brigham and Women's Hospital expect to understand the ALX axis in such a way that will allow them to formulate new therapies and drug targets to treat people with asthma, especially severe asthma, more effectively. In Boston, this study will be run together by the Asthma Research Center at the Brigham and Women's Hospital (adults) and Boston Children's Hospital (children).

An observational cross-sectional study will include 750 individuals of all ages, divided in 4 groups: 1) Patients with a self-reported diagnosis of asthma alone (n=150), 2) Patients with a self-reported diagnosis of rhinitis alone (n=150), 3) Patients with a self-reported diagnosis of asthma and rhinitis (n=150) and 4) Patients with no history of respiratory symptoms or diseases (n=300)

ASTHMA: Asthma is a chronic inflammatory disorder of the airways in which many different types of cells, and various cellular components. The chronic inflammation causes an increase of the over-responsiveness of the airways, which leads to recurrent episodes of wheezing, breathlessness, chest tightness, and coughing, particularly at night or in the early morning hours. These episodes, usually associated with widespread but variable block the airway, which is usually reversible either spontaneously or by treatment. Asthma is one of the most common chronic diseases worldwide, posing significant social burden in both children and adults. It is estimated that about 300 million people currently suffer from asthma. The incidence of asthma is universal regardless of the level of development of the country. There is evidence that over the last 20 years the prevalence has increased significantly, specially in pediatric populations. COPD: Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is a major public health problem. It is the fourth leading cause of chronic morbidity and mortality in the United States after heart disease, strokes and acute respiratory infections, while on an annual basis, the disease robs the lives of more than 3,000,000 people around us worldwide. The most worrying is that the impact has been steadily rising, and this dramatic increase in the frequency shows that by 2020 the disease will be the third leading cause of death. In Greece, 8.4% of the population suffers from COPD. Smoking is the leading cause of COPD. However, not all smokers develop the clinical picture of COPD, suggesting that additional factors are involved in manifestation. Further investigation of risk factors for COPD, methods of reducing exposure to these agents and the molecular and cellular mechanisms involved in the pathogenesis remain a major area of research to develop effective treatments that will reduce or prevent the development the disease.

The study aim is to compare usual asthma crisis treatment of hospitalized children with usual treatment associated to sophrology.

The investigators' hypothesis is that dysregulation of autonomic function, as revealed during a simulated dive reflex, may result in an attenuation of the heart rate response to a greater degree in asthmatics who collapse during exacerbations of asthma than that seen in healthy individuals and in asthmatics without a history of syncope. The investigators will test this by assessing autonomic function through a dive reflex protocol.

We hypothesized that the ability of the Lung Flute to enhance mucus clearance from the lower airways could be used to improve asthma control, if the device is used on a chronic basis. The primary end point of the study is the comparison of Asthma Control Test (ACT) - a validated questionnaire for asthma control and exhaled NO before, during and after using the lung flute. Several secondary end points were assessed for efficacy and safety, including health status, spirometric lung function, "stepping down" controller therapy and daily albuterol use.

Asthma is the most common chronic childhood illness and disproportionately affects children who are ethnic minorities and poor. Few studies of childhood asthma have been conducted with children who live in rural areas or have included Mexican American children in their samples. This study builds on the original R01NR007770 with findings that demonstrated the intervention could improve children's asthma self-management, asthma knowledge, metered dose inhaler skill, asthma severity, and parents' asthma management and access to care. In this competing continuation, the investigators added a third arm to the current research design with schools randomized into either an in-school asthma intervention, an in-school attention-control intervention, or an alternate intervention-delivery format of a single 5.5-hour asthma day camp. The tri-ethnic sample will be composed of 320 Mexican-American, African-American, and White rural school-aged children (grades 2-5) who have asthma and their parents. In addition, the investigators propose adding a non-invasive measure of chronic airway inflammation (exhaled nitric oxide) to assess the impact of changes in asthma management on airway inflammation. Families will be followed for a full year with data collection at baseline and at 1-month, 4-months, and 7-months after the intervention to assess improvement in children's asthma morbidity, asthma severity, airway inflammation, family asthma management and quality of life. Hypotheses (H): Children in the Camp-Workshop group and the School-Home group will demonstrate equivalent improvements, but greater improvements than the Attention-Control group in:(H1.1) their asthma severity and airway inflammation from the Time 1 assessment when compared to Time 4 assessment; (H1.2) office visits, ED visits, and hospitalizations for asthma, and absenteeism for the study year (Time 4) when compared to the pre-study year (Time 1); and (H1.4) Parents in the intervention arms will demonstrate sustained improvements in asthma caregiver's quality of life (QOL0 from the pre-study year (Time 1) to the end of the study year (Time 4) measurement, when compared to the Attention-Control group.

We want to examine the effect of multidisciplinary interventions in asthma patients who had experienced acute exacerbation of asthma. In our previous observational studies, elderly asthma patients had a some distinct features such as impairment of cognitive function, deficiency of micronutrient and absence of caregiver compared with young adult asthmatics. We wanted to evaluate whether the long-term course of asthma could be modified by intervening deficienies which were found in elderly patiensts. So, we designed a interventional study to correct above risk factors in elderly asthma patients, which could be aggravating their asthma. Followings are our specific multidiciplinary items that we want to correct. popularize and educate the asthma action plan run a emergency call system for acute exacerbation educate the proper techniques using inhalers correct the deficiency of magnesium (magnesium 500 mg per day) After 1 years, we will measure the numbers of acute exacerbations, lung function including FEV1 and FEV1/FVC, health-related quality of life and level of serum magnesium in study patients.

The purpose of this study is to find out whether adjunct treatment with inhaled corticosteroids lead to faster improvement and reduce mortality of children under 5 years of age admitted to hospital with ALRI.

This is a research study to find associations between asthma symptoms and sleep patterns and physical activity among adolescent patients with persistent asthma. The Investigators will collect Fitbit® sensor data and survey data from each adolescent enrolled in the study.