In the area of treatment, a recent NIAID-sponsored clinical trial found that augmenting NIH asthma guidelines-based therapy with a drug that targets immunoglobulin E, an antibody that plays a key role in allergy, nearly eliminated seasonal increases in asthma attacks and significantly decreased asthma symptoms among inner-city youth.

Finally, NIAID, NHLBI, and several other NIH institutes, together with the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and the Merck Childhood Asthma Network, co-sponsored a workshop to develop standardized definitions and data collection methods for asthma clinical studies. These standards will enable investigators to better compare results across studies and better inform the direction of future research. The March 2010 workshop participants reached consensus on seven key outcome measures that will be required in future NIH-sponsored asthma clinical trials and observational studies: symptoms, exacerbations, biomarkers, lung function, quality of life, asthma control questionnaire results and health care utilization and cost. The workshop report will be published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology in fall 2011.

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NIEHS supports research to understand the effects of the environment on human health and is part of NIH.

The NHLBI plans, conducts, and supports research related to the causes, prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of heart, blood vessel, lung, and blood diseases; and sleep disorders. The Institute also administers national health education campaigns on women and heart disease, asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and other topics.

NIAID conducts and supports research - at NIH, throughout the United States, and worldwide - to study the causes of infectious and immune-mediated diseases, and to develop better means of preventing, diagnosing and treating these illnesses.

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Source: National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS)