1) Pathophysiology of Severe Asthma

Role of Cytokines in Pathophysiology of Asthma

The worldwide incidence, morbidity and mortality of asthma are increasing dramatically. It is one of the most common disorders encountered in clinical medicine in both children and adults. It affects approximately 5% of the adult population in the western world and its reported incidence is increasing vigorously in many developed nations. A network of a novel mediator known as ‘pleiotropic cyto...

Acute severe asthma: pathophysiology and pathobiology of gas exchange abnormalities.

Acute severe asthma, or "status asthmaticus", is a devastating clinical condition ultimately resulting in life-threatening hypoxaemia. The pivotal intrapulmonary mechanism of this condition is profound ventilation/perfusion (V'A/Q') mismatch, characterized by a predominant bimodal blood flow pattern reflecting a marked deterioration (increase) of the dispersion of pulmonary blood flow. This V'A...

Pathophysiology of asthma.

1. Our understanding of asthma and its therapy has changed markedly over the last few years, particularly with the application of molecular and cell biology and the discovery of new and more specific pharmacological tools. 2. Many inflammatory cells participate in the inflammatory process in asthma and mediate a complex mixture of mediators. Cytokines are of particular importance as mediators o...

The pathophysiology of asthma.

Because postmortem studies of humans provide little information on the initial pathophysiologic events in asthma, animal models have been developed. Recently the Ascaris-allergic rhesus monkey has provided an opportunity to examine the onset of pathophysiologic changes following challenge and to correlate them with airway structure. These studies have suggested that the initial interaction betw...

Refractory asthma, Part 1: Epidemiology, pathophysiology, pharmacologic interventions.