Active clinical trials for "Asthma"

This is a 3-month non-interventional, observational study on patients with moderate and severe asthma.

An observational study to investigate how patients experience the ability to adjust their asthma maintenance medication according to instructions received from their physician. The primary aim is to create an insight in the perception of the patient when he has the ability to adjust his own maintenance treatment and how the patient exercises this in the daily practice.

Asthma is a disease that affects the lungs. Symptoms include repeated episodes of wheezing, breathlessness, chest tightness, and nighttime or early morning coughing. Some people with asthma experience worse symptoms at night, which is known as nocturnal asthma (NA). The reason for the decline in lung function at night in some asthmatics is not well understood, but it may be linked to the human biological clock, which controls daily activity and sleep rhythms. To determine whether differences in biological clocks relate to worsening nocturnal lung function, this study will evaluate the circadian rhythms of people with NA, people with non-nocturnal asthma, and healthy people.

Asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are diseases that affect a person's ability to breathe normally. People who do not receive enough vitamin D may have a higher risk of developing asthma or COPD. This study will examine previously collected blood samples of participants in three studies to determine whether people with low vitamin D levels have an increased risk of severe asthma or COPD.

The purpose of this study is to analyze markers of inflammation in blood and in induced sputum for the purpose of identifying molecular markers of specific asthma phenotypes. The investigators' specific interest is demonstrating that periostin levels are higher than normal in blood. The investigators already have solid preliminary data to support this hypothesis, and our goal here is to replicate preliminary findings and extend them by examining further the characteristics of the asthma subgroup with elevated periostin levels.

To determine whether an innovative clinical decision support system embedded in an existing electronic health record (EHR) will improve provider adherence to the existing National Asthma Education and Prevention Program (NAEPP) guidelines. 12 primary care pediatric practices at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia(both urban and suburban sites) will be randomized to receive either a passive EHR (control sites) or an interactive decision support system (intervention sites).

Asthma in children is recognized as a disease area with a high medical need. As the investigators move into this field it is necessary to improve the investigators knowledge of upper airway anatomical structure in paediatric patients. This study will provide airway/facial morphologies from controlled asthmatic patients. Limited facial morphology can be used in order to build models to study the delivery of medication through a device that requires for example a facemask. In this study the anatomical structure of the upper airway and the facial geometry will be evaluated using a Cone Beam Computed Tomography (CBCT) scan. The scan will be taken in a population of 20 asthmatic children between 6 and 12 years old.

Although some causal factors in allergy development such as allergen exposure and environmental pollution have decreased during recent years, the incidence of the allergic diseases has increased in the Western world. Since the genetic predisposition to develop allergies cannot change in such a short time it is conceivable that, instead of the emerging of some new and unknown risk factors, some protective factors seem to have disappeared in the Western world. Allergic disease is a tendency to develop allergies to allergens in the surrounding environment. The most common symptoms are eczema and food allergy in the early life, bronchial asthma (AB) later in childhood and allergic rhino conjunctivitis (ARC) during school age and adolescence, the so-called allergic march. Some person may develop only one, but others some or all of the symptoms. Inheritance, environment and allergen exposure are important factors affecting this march but there are important factors that predict later development of diseases. Sensitization to egg (positive skin prick test or specific IgE to egg in the serum) combined with skin problems in infancy predispose strongly to the development of allergic asthma in later life. The purpose of this work is to supply children with early development of IgE associated eczema and food allergy with omega-3 LCPUFA before the age of 12 months and assess the effect of the supplementation on the future development of skin symptoms, food allergy, sensitisation against inhalant allergens and asthma in these children. We will also assess immunological markers of Th2-skewed immunity in relation to clinical effect of the supplementation. Families with children younger than 12 months referred to the paediatric department at Linköping University Hospital, Motala, Norrköping and Jönköping Hospitals in the South East of Sweden, with the diagnosis IgE associated eczema and sensitised against food allergens (egg, milk, wheat and/or soya) will be invited to participate in this study. Clinical examination by a paediatrician and assessment of disease severity with SCORAD will be performed by a research nurse at inclusion. The children will be assessed every six months by a nurse until 2.5 years of age and by a paediatrician at 3 years of age. Later clinical assessment will be performed yearly until age 7.

Vigorous exercise is known to cause transient bronchoconstriction in school children with asthma, many of whom initially have normal lung function at rest. The presence and extent of this phenomena in early childhood is difficult to recognize, because exercise induced bronchoconstriction (EIB) may not limit the child's performance and the child may fail to notice the symptoms until taking part in organized or competitive sport. Conversely, as children do participate in vigorous activities all day long, severe EIB may provoke a crucial disabling condition in the child. In school children the exercise challenge test (ECT) is a well standardized test and is used to make a diagnosis of asthma because it is able to discriminate between asthma and other chronic breathing illnesses of childhood and is also used to determine the effectiveness and optimal dosages of medications prescribed to prevent EIB. The test includes is a controlled run on a motor-driven treadmill followed by scheduled multiple spirometry maneuvers. This procedure was never been tested and may not be suitable for the preschool age. In this study we assumed that a free-run test which combined with measurements of duplicate spirometry-sets would be the most convenient way to test young children. The aims of this study are a) to examine the feasibility of a free-run protocol (according to the ATS/ERS recomendations), followed by duplicate spirometry measurements in early childhood. b) to explore the existence of exercise induced bronchoconstriction in young children (age 3-6 years old) with respiratory symptoms.

Asthma is a common illness among children in the United States. While there are many known causes of asthma, including tobacco smoke, pollen, dust, or other allergens, the exact cause of asthma in some individuals remains unknown. This study will examine the role that specific dietary factors and body mass index (BMI) play in the development of childhood asthma.