Outpatient management of bronchial asthma.
The current approach to asthma treatment centers around the recognition that asthma is primarily an inflammatory condition; airway hyperresponsiveness and bronchospasm are secondary phenomena. Anti-inflammatory treatments that produce sustained improvement in airway hyperresponsiveness (environmental control, cromolyn, inhaled and ingested corticosteroids) are the mainstay of treatment to keep symptoms and bronchodilator use to a minimum. Adequate control of chronic asthma with clearly defined treatment goals, accompanied by early recognition and patient-initiated treatment of worsened asthma, generally with inhaled/ingested corticosteroid, can successfully reduce the high morbidity and the low, but significant, mortality from this common condition.
Department of Medicine, University of Saskatchewan/University Hospital, Saskatoon, Canada.
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Cockcroft
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Hargreave
D001249:Asthma / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000628:therapy*; D006801:Humans; D010353:Patient Education as Topic