View clinical trials related to Exacerbation.
Filter by:Neutrophilic asthma (NA) is the least known severe asthma phenotype. It is associated with more exacerbations, worse control and impaired lung function. One of its possible etiologies is bronchial infections. The study of bronchial microbiology and its relationship with exacerbations is a new line of research. Objectives: 1) To analyze bronchial microbiome in patients with AN and non-neutrophilic (ANN), with frequent exacerbations and without exacerbations. 2) To relate the presence of bronchial infections with differences in the microbiome. 3) Correlate the characteristics of the microbiome with other evidence used in exacerbations. Methods: Prospective study involving 40 non-smoking asthmatics without bronchiectasis (20 with AN and 20 with ANN). Of these, 10 in each group will have frequent exacerbations (>2 rounds of systemic steroids in the last year, of >3 days each) and 10 non- frequent exacerbations. AN will be defined as >65% neutrophils in stable phase sputum. All patients will have two stable visits in which clinical variables, asthma control, lung function and induced sputum samples will be collected (for analysis of bronchial inflammatory cell count and for the study of the microbiome by 16 subunit rRNA). Specific Immunoglobulin A (IgA) for Chlamydia Pneumoniae will be determined. In exacerbations, sputum samples will be collected for culture and nasopharyngeal smears for the study of major respiratory viruses and bacteria by multiple polymerase chain reaction.
Rationale: Acute exacerbations are key events in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), resulting in poorer quality of life. Causes include irritants, viruses and bacterial pathogens. These exacerbations are often treated with a combination of corticosteroids, bronchodilators and antibiotics, but the benefit of antibiotic therapy remains controversial. Several trials studying antibiotic treatment in AECOPD showed conflicting data, with several large studies failing to demonstrate superiority of antibiotic therapy over placebo. Other trials indicated that antibiotic therapy is effective in patients who have at least two of the following symptoms: increased dyspnoea, increased sputum volume and increased sputum purulence. Ever since sputum purulence has been used as a predictive marker in AECOPD, a strategy that has been integrated in the GOLD guideline for treatment of AECOPD. However, the color of sputum reported by patients is not always reliable and inspection of sputum is not always possible. Several serum biomarkers such as C-reactive protein (CRP) and procalcitonin (PCT) are now available. In a recent trial of doxycycline in addition to systemic corticosteroids for patients hospitalized with AECOPD we found that CRP might be valuable as a marker predictive of response to antibiotic treatment in AECOPD.