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Aerobic Exercise Good for Asthma Patients
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Medpagetoday.com REPORTS HERE that "physical training programs involving aerobic exercise have a range of benefits for patients with asthma, an updated Cochrane review showed. Patients who participated in the programs had improvements in asthma symptoms and cardiopulmonary fitness without any adverse effects on lung function .... There also was some evidence that the exercise programs improved health-related quality of life ...."

"Many patients with asthma forgo regular exercise because physical activity can increase airway resistance and induce bronchoconstriction. The low levels of activity then lead to chronic deconditioning, with some studies reporting that asthmatics tend to have lower cardiopulmonary fitness than their nonasthmatic counterparts."

"Numerous physical training programs have been designed to improve fitness, neuromuscular coordination, and self-confidence in patients with asthma, although the results have varied."

"The lack of adverse effects is reassuring .... and therefore there's no reason why asthmatic subjects who are stable could not participate in physical training programs, provided they are given proper medical advice."

In a related asthma report FOUND HERE that "for patients with severe or difficult-to-treat asthma, as exacerbation severity increases, quality of life suffers, researchers found. Worsening exacerbation severity was associated with poorer scores both in overall quality of life and in each individual domain -- symptom, activity, emotional, and exposure .... Similar associations with quality of life were observed with increasing numbers of exacerbations and with asthma triggers...."

"The findings demonstrate the importance of assessing asthma-related quality of life, and support the evolving body of literature demonstrating that poor quality of life -- or certain components of quality of life -- may be associated with asthma risk and with poorer airflow."

"The current analysis included 2,679 patients 13 and older. All reported asthma-related quality of life each year using the Mini-Asthma Quality of Life Questionnaire. Exacerbations were stratified according to severity, ranging from no exacerbations, to a requirement for steroid bursts, to an emergency room visit, to hospitalization."

"Asthma triggers included emotional stress, upper respiratory infections, pollen, animals, mold or dampness, and dust. Overall, 51.6% of the patients did not have exacerbations, 34% required steroid bursts, 8.4% visited the emergency room, and 5.9% were hospitalized."

"As the severity of the exacerbations increased, patients tended to be younger and heavier, to have worse lung function, and to be more likely to be female, non-white, and treated by a pulmonologist versus an allergist. Within the first year of follow-up, increasing severity and numbers of exacerbations were associated with declining quality of life.

Similarly, an increasing number of asthma triggers was associated with both worsening quality of life and an increasing rate of exacerbations."

 
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Original clinical study reports, which contain far more detail than published randomized trials, should be made available to independent researchers seeking to verify efficacy and safety claims.

In support of this argument, the history of the influenza antiviral oseltamivir (Tamiflu), which was approved by the FDA in 1999, was cited. The widespread belief in oseltamivir's efficacy, was based on a meta-analysis of 10 trials conducted by the manufacturer prior to licensure.  But the authors pointed out that the FDA, which was aware of these clinical trials, concluded that oseltamivir had not been shown to reduce complications and required a statement on the drug's label to that effect.  Moreover, oseltamivir was not given an FDA indication for prevention of spread of influenza.

To this, [authors] commented, "If FDA is right, the drug's effectiveness may be no better than aspirin or acetaminophen.'"

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