Protein HMGB1 may be the key to better asthma treatment

Asthma causes an individual's airways to become inflamed and narrow, and additional mucus is produced. Breathing becomes difficult for this person, who may wheeze and cough as a result.
An estimated 1 in 12 people in the United States have asthma, which equates to around 25 million people.
Worryingly, the number of individuals with asthma appears to be rising. Between 2001 and 2009, the number of U.S. individuals diagnosed with asthma grew by 4.3 million. In 2007, asthma was linked to 3,447 deaths in the country.
There are a range of potential triggers for asthma. These include pollen, molds, dust mites, animal dander, air pollution, certain medications, and exercise.....

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Asthma Much More Lethal for Black Children, Study Finds

SATURDAY, March 4, 2017 (HealthDay News) -- Asthma attacks can prove deadly to kids, but a new study shows that black American children are six times more likely to die of the illness than their white or Hispanic peers.
The gap in death rates "may imply a differential access to care" based on a family's race, said lead author Dr. Anna Chen Arroyo, in a news release from the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology. She is from Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.
Arroyo was slated to present the findings Saturday at the academy's annual meeting in Atlanta.....

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Patients with asthma see improvement from Xolair

ATLANTA — Patients with asthma who were treated with Xolair reported fewer exacerbations and other improvements, according to findings presented at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology.
“Real-world data are important to supplement clinical trial data in heterogeneous diseases like asthma,” Bradley W. Chipps, MD, of the Capital Allergy and Respiratory Disease Center, Sacramento, California, and colleagues wrote. “We report the results of a U.S.-based, multicenter, prospective, 48-week observational registration of patients with allergic asthma using [omalizumab (Xolair, Genentech, Novartis)]”.....

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