Asthma Origins Identified

A new study may have uncovered a main cause of asthma in children. The report, published in this month's Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, suggests birth weight is connected to the development of the respiratory disorder.

Researchers used national, publicly available data gathered on low birth weight babies born in 1988. More than 8,000 individuals filled out questionnaires about the presence or absence of asthma symptoms in children in their care who were categorized as being born with a low birth weight. This is defined as children born weighing less than 1,500 grams or 3.3 pounds. Asthma is immediately present in some LBW babies as a wheezing sound and a reduced oxygen capacity compared to children born within the normal weight ranges.

A wide variety of diagnoses of wheezing in low-birth weight (LBW) babies by different physicians may increase the risk for asthma-related deaths later in these children's lives due to lack of appropriate intervention. In the past 20 years, asthma in children up to the age of 4 years has risen 164 percent in the United States.

Researchers say they found more LBW infants with asthma among African Americans but suggest the connection is more likely due to more LBW infants in this group than to a stronger connection.

This study is the first to suggest that LBW and asthma have a stronger connection in LBW children belonging to racial minorities compared to LBW children taken as a group. These findings, say researchers, may provide more insight into the pathophysiology of the disease and information needed to better educate providers and parents. Also, with this information, researchers say they may be able to better focus early intervention programs to reduce asthma to specific ethnic communities.