Characteristics and treatment regimens across ERS SHARP severe asthma registries

Little is known about the characteristics and treatments of patients with severe asthma across Europe, but both are likely to vary. This is the first study in the European Respiratory Society Severe Heterogeneous Asthma Research collaboration, Patient-centred (SHARP) Clinical Research Collaboration and it is designed to explore these variations. Therefore, we aimed to compare characteristics of patients in European severe asthma registries and treatments before starting biologicals.This was a cross-sectional retrospective analysis of aggregated data from 11 national severe asthma registries that joined SHARP with established patient databases.Analysis of data from 3236 patients showed many …

Higher blood eosinophil levels after omalizumab treatment may be associated with poorer asthma outcomes

Identifying suitable proxies for climate change impacts in shallow Mediterranean habitats: sponge filtration not a ready-to-use tool yet

The identi#cation of reliable proxies is crucial to undertake experimental manipulation and test hypotheses on climate change impacts. We evaluated the potential use of sponge #ltering activity as a proxy for the e$ect of temperature (T) increase in shallow marine habitats since: i) Porifera are ubiquitous, sessile and long-lived aquatic organisms; ii) Porifera are active #lter feeders and play a key-role in benthic-pelagic coupling; iii) #ltering activity already proved reliable to detect T e$ects on bivalves. The systematic screening of current literature to gather data and test the assumption “T increase -> increase in sponge #ltering activity” led to a #rst list of 840 sources (title re…

Update on standardization and interpretation of lung function test in adult and pediatric patients

Sensitization to Horse Allergens in Italy: A Multicentre Study in Urban Atopic Subjects without Occupational Exposure.

<i>Background:</i> Horses play a significant role in people’s leisure time in Italy and other countries, but few data are available on IgE-mediated sensitization to horse allergens in patients without occupational exposure. We assessed, in a multicentric survey, the prevalence of horse sensitization in atopic subjects and its clinical characteristics. <i>Methods:</i> Allergists from the whole Italian territory were required to collect the results of skin prick tests from at least 100 consecutive subjects. Those patients with a positive skin test to horse dander underwent a detailed interview concerning clinical history, pet ownership and possible exposure. <i>R…

Measuring sponge feeding habit: an analysis across the literature

Asthma control in elderly asthmatics. An Italian observational study

SummaryBackgroundThe exponential increase of individuals aged >64 yrs is expected to impact the burden of asthma. We aimed to explore the level of asthma control in elderly subjects, and factors influencing it.MethodsA multicenter observational study was performed on consecutive patients >64 years old with a documented physician-diagnosis of asthma. Sixteen Italian centers were involved in this 6-month project.FindingsA total of 350 patients were enrolled in the study. More than one-third of elderly asthmatic patients, despite receiving GINA step 3–4 antiasthmatic therapy, had an Asthma Control Test score ≤19, with a quarter experiencing at least one severe asthma exacerbation in the previo…

COVID-19 in Severe Asthma Network in Italy (SANI) patients: Clinical features, impact of comorbidities and treatments

To the Editor Since the end of February 2020 Italy, first non- Asian Country, has reported an ever increasing number of COronaVIrus Disease 19 (COVID-19) patients, which has reached over 200,000 confirmed Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome-Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) infected subjects and resulted in more than 34000 deaths (data updated to June 19th, 20201).Patients with asthma are potentially more severely affected by by SARS-CoV-2 infection 2 and it is well established that respiratory viral infections are associated with severe adverse outcomes in patients with asthma, including increased risk of asthma exacerbation episodes 3. Nonetheless, according to the epidemiological studies publishe…