Overweight Children With Asthma Less Likely to Respond to Treatment

TUESDAY, Sept. 21, 2021 (HealthDay News) — There is a markedly increased risk for poor response to inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) among children with asthma and a high body mass index (BMI), according to a study presented at the European Respiratory Society International Congress 2021, held virtually from Sept. 5 to 8.

Cristina Longo, a postdoctoral fellow at the Amsterdam University Medical Center when the research was conducted and who is now at the University of Montreal, and colleagues estimated the association between BMI z-score and ICS response using Mendelian randomization methods. The analysis included data from five cohorts totaling 1,511 children (aged 2 to 16 years) with asthma using ICS.

The researchers found that the pooled mean BMI z-score was 0.69, with the proportion of poor ICS response ranging from 20 to 80 percent across studies. In a meta-analysis, the odds of poor response for each standard deviation increase in BMI z-score was 2.31, with similar results seen in sensitivity analyses.

“For children and their parents, our results shed light on the reasons why some children may not be responding to their steroid inhaler as expected, especially if they are having more frequent asthma attacks than expected after starting this therapy,” Longo said in a statement. “Our results might also be the catalyst that parents and their children need to modify their diet and increase exercise. This might improve the child’s BMI status and their response to inhaled steroids.”

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