Asthma is a disease that causes the airways to swell up and tighten, making it hard to catch your breath. Symptoms include:

Symptoms can be more severe in some people and less severe in others. You might only have symptoms at certain times, like when you exercise. You could also have frequent asthma attacks that affect your quality of life.

Asthma isn’t curable, but it is manageable. Today’s treatments are more effective than ever at preventing asthma attacks and stopping symptoms if they do start.

Still, 17 percent of asthma cases are labeled as difficult to treat. This means they don’t respond to standard treatments, like The drug is inhaled..

A new generation of therapies and other treatments may offer some relief for those with severe symptoms.

The treatment of asthma involves three parts.

  • Long-term management medications can be used to prevent symptoms.
  • Quick-relief medications can be used to stop asthma attacks.
  • The number of attacks can be reduced by avoiding triggering.

To manage severe asthma, you may need to take higher doses of medications or use more than one medication. You and your doctor can create an asthma management plan to personalize your treatment strategy based on your symptoms and disease severity.

Long-term management medications help prevent asthma symptoms, and are the main treatment for severe asthma. These include:

  • The drug is inhaled.
  • There are long-acting alpha-agonists.
  • The anticholinergics are long-acting.
  • The leukotriene modifiers are used.
  • Cromolyn sodium is found in Intal.
  • Theochron is the name for theophylline.
  • The oral drug.

If you have an asthma attack, you can take quick-relief medications to relieve symptoms. These include:

  • Short-acting alpha-agonists are inhaled.
  • Short-acting anticholinergics are inhaled.
  • A combination of both of those things.

Severe asthma is easier to manage with newer treatments.

Biologics

Biologic drugs work with your immune system to treat asthma. They block the activity of immune system chemicals that make your airways swell up. These drugs can help prevent asthma attacks and make the attacks you do have more mild.

Six monoclonal antibodies are approved to treat asthma.

  • The drug is called Closair.
  • Mepolizumab is a drug.
  • omalizumab is a drug.
  • benralizumab is a drug.
  • dupilumab is a drug
  • Tezspire is a drug.

Severe asthma can be treated with Omalizumab. Thelizumab,Reslizumab, and benralizumab are used to treat severe asthma caused by an eosinophil. You can take these drugs by injection or IV.

Patients between the ages of 6 to 11 are currently approved for Dupliumb. This treatment is done with an injection.

Tezepelumab is used for patients 12 and older. It is the first treatment that does not limit the type of asthma. This treatment is also injected.

Tiotropium (Spiriva)

This inhaled medication has been used to treat chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) for more than a decade. In 2015, the FDA also approved it for the treatment of asthma.

A 2016 review found that tiotropium improves asthma management when added to high doses of The drug is inhaled. and short-acting beta-agonists.

Leukotriene modifiers

One group of asthma drugs works. This chemical narrows your airway during an asthma attack.

Three The leukotriene modifiers are used. are approved to treat asthma:

  • montelukast is a word.
  • The word zeafirlukast means “Accolate.”
  • Zyflo is a zileuton.

You take the medications by mouth.

Bronchial thermoplasty

Bronchial thermoplasty is a surgical technique used for severe asthma that hasn’t improved with other treatments.

The airway is being treated with radiofrequency energy. The airway is destroyed by the heat that generated. The muscle is not narrowed or cinched.

Bronchial thermoplasty is delivered in three sessions, each given 3 weeks apart. Even though it isn’t a cure for asthma, 2018 research shows it does reduce symptoms.

New drugs that will prevent and relieve asthma symptoms are still being researched. Fevipiprant is a drug that has potential.

While in development, this experimental drug reduced symptoms and airway inflammation in people with allergic asthma that The drug is inhaled. could not, according to 2016 research.

However, the company Novaris, which was developing Fevipiprant, decided to cease further development due to trials showing that the drug didn’t do much better than a placebo.

There is research looking at how combining multiple existing medications can help manage asthma attacks.

A 2021 review suggests adding long-acting muscarinic antagonist to The drug is inhaled. and long-acting β2-agonists could lead to fewer severe asthma attacks and modest improvement in asthma management.

Other studies are investigating the factors that play a role in asthma development, such as calcium-sensing receptor (CaSR). Identifying the triggers that set off asthma symptoms could one day enable researchers to stop those processes and prevent asthma before it starts.

Asthma causes the airways to swell up and make it hard to breathe. There is no cure for asthma, but there are options that can help.

If you have severe symptoms, you may require multiple treatment options for your asthma. Talk with your doctor about which options are best for you.