Body Types and Asthma

As this nation has become more obese the rate of asthma has increased. A lot of research has been done and a link has been established between being overweight and having asthma. Some doctors are beginning to think that different body types respond to asthma differently. Now they are beginning to wonder if some of the available medications work best for people that are lean and some for people that are obese.

Medication

Research has determined that overweight people will do better with a pill sold by prescription called Singulair then with the type of steroid that is inhaled and lean individuals will do better using the inhaled form of steroid. The name of the inhaled steroid is beclomethassone but is sold as vanceril, beclovent or possibility other names.  This information has appeared in the European Respiratory Journal.

Even though it has been agreed upon that obese individuals are more likely to have asthma there is no knowledge about how the obesity influences a good or bad response to a particular asthma medication. New findings are leading to the possibility that weight might be a leading factor on how well the patient will respond to a given medication.

How the Tests came Out
Researchers studied data collected from four clinical tests. The information gave the patient’s responses to different types of medication taking into consideration their body weight; they were placed into groups of overweight, obese and normal.

The medications given were singulair, an inhaled steroid and last of all a placebo.  The asthma was worse in the people that were either overweight or obese. The inhaled steroid was better than Singulair at increasing the number of good days; which would be no night attacks and just a couple of puffs on the inhaler for the people that were normal in weight.

The benefit decreased as the weight went up. The response of the pill, Singulair did not lessen in either the overweight or obese people as compared to the people that were considered normal in weight. The placebo did not affect those that were overweight and obese people.

New Thoughts About Asthma

Research is being done concerning asthma and the genetic factor the thought being that this might help explain why there are different variations in the responses to medications. They think there might be a variety of factors influencing an asthmatic condition. Both the weight factor and the genetic factor combine with others to determine a response to the medication.