Evolving Strategies for Long-term Asthma Management

Research in the 1960s and 1970s revealed increasing prevalence of asthma in the US and internationally, the importance of airway inflammation in asthma, and the role of indoor aeroallergens as causal or aggravating environmental factors in many patients with asthma. The introduction of inhaled corticosteroid (ICS) treatment for asthma in the 1970s provided an effective approach to long-term pharmacologic therapy. In 1991, the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute sponsored the development of the National Asthma Education and Prevention Program (NAEPP) Guidelines for the Diagnosis and Management of Asthma, offering clinicians a synthesis of new and evolving treatments and a practical approach to management. These guidelines, periodically updated since then, have had a major effect on clinical practice, and in this issue of JAMA, an update of the NAEPP guidelines summarizes new recommendations for long-term management of adolescents and adults with asthma.
Source: JAMA - Category: General Medicine Source Type: research