ASthma Triggers and Outcomes

What is it about?

Although patients’ observations of asthma triggers provide important information for diagnosis and management of asthma, their role in predicting asthma outcomes has rarely been studied. We found that non-allergic triggers, including physical activity, air pollution, infections, and psychological factors, are associated with 1.5 to 3-fold odds for adverse asthma outcomes, even after controlling for demographics, asthma severity, allergic triggers, and clinically significant anxiety and depression. Psychological triggers specifically doubled the odds of asthma control impairments, exacerbations, and emergency treatments.

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Why is it important?

Exploration of asthma triggers with standardized questionnaire instruments can add valuable information to individualized treatment and self-management of the disease. Asthma is increasingly recognized as a heterogeneous disease and patient trigger reports can contribute to the identification of asthma phenotypes.