Could That Rash Be an Allergic Reaction?
Is There A Recommended Room Temperature For Asthma?
The best room temperature for people with asthma is between 68°F and 71°F with a lower humidity between 30% and 50%. This mild air temperature and humidity won't irritate the airways.
The ideal room temperature for people with asthma is a mild temperature with lower humidity.
Extreme temperatures and humidity levels can trigger an asthma attack. However, you can lower your risk indoors by adjusting the room temperature and avoiding possible irritants that could affect your asthma symptoms.
Very hot temperatures with high humidity and very cold temperatures can worsen asthma. That's why experts recommend more mild temperatures.
However, there is not much specific research examining the exact room temperature that may be best for someone with asthma.
In a small study from 2012, researchers found that a room temperature of 68°F to 71°F (20°C to 21.6°C) is ideal for people with asthma.
Aside from that older research, there's not much to show the best temperature.
The American Lung Association recommends the same indoor temperature and air quality conditions in its guidelines on safe school environments, and it advises people with asthma to avoid cold and extreme temperatures.
Most health experts recommend that people with asthma avoid extreme hot or cold temperatures and limit exposure to humidity.
Along with limiting exposure to poor air quality and issues like dust inside, these are good preventive measures to take for people who live with asthma.
Tips to help your indoor air qualityThere are several devices you can use to create the ideal temperature and humidity levels indoors:
Be sure to clean these appliances regularly, too. Doing so minimizes harmful bacteria and dust, which can reduce your home's air quality.
The best device for you depends on your asthma triggers, the current weather, and the air quality in your home.
Because asthma involves the airways, inhaling the air directly affects asthma symptoms. Different aspects of the air, including temperature and humidity, determine these symptoms.
Sudden changes in air temperature can trigger asthma. For example, a sudden change can occur if it's hot outside and you enter a cool building.
Specifically, extreme air temperature and high humidity (both indoors and outdoors) can worsen asthma.
Heat
It can be difficult to breathe in a hot and humid environment because inhaling this air can tighten your airways. You may also breathe faster in hot weather, becoming dehydrated and triggering asthma symptoms.
Hot temperatures may also increase pollen counts and air pollution levels. Pollen and pollution can trigger asthma symptoms.
Cold
A cold environment can also worsen asthma symptoms. Cold air, which is often dry, causes the mucus that naturally coats your airways to quickly evaporate, irritating and narrowing your airways.
Asthma Outcomes Improve With Specialist Allergy Treatment
CHILDREN with asthma enrolled in Arkansas Medicaid who received allergy specialist care had a 21% lower likelihood of experiencing asthma-related adverse events (AAEs) compared to those who did not.
Asthma is a common chronic condition in children, frequently requiring specialised care to manage symptoms and prevent exacerbations. Allergy specialists play a critical role in tailoring treatment plans, especially for children with persistent asthma or atopic conditions. Recent research aimed to evaluate whether children with asthma enrolled in the Arkansas Medicaid programme benefited from allergy specialist care in reducing AAEs, including emergency department visits and hospitalisations.
Using the Arkansas All-Payers Claims Database, researchers identified children enrolled in Medicaid who received allergy specialist care in 2018. These children were matched to peers who did not receive such care, using propensity score matching to account for differences such as asthma severity and vaccination status. The matched cohort included 2,964 children in each group, with 10.1% of participants experiencing an AAE in 2019. Logistic regression analysis revealed that children who visited an allergy specialist in 2018 had 21.0% lower odds of an AAE in 2019 compared to those without specialist care (adjusted odds ratio [aOR], 0.79; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.63–0.98; P = 0.04). The marginal effect analysis showed a reduction in AAEs from 11.0% to 9.1%. Before matching, children who visited an allergy specialist were more likely to have persistent asthma, atopic conditions, and receive influenza vaccination, highlighting the role of targeted care in high-risk groups.
These findings underline the value of allergy specialist care in improving asthma outcomes for children enrolled in Medicaid. Incorporating guideline-based allergy specialist care into asthma management programmes could lead to significant reductions in emergency visits and hospitalisations. Developing quality metrics based on these recommendations could enhance patient outcomes and reduce healthcare utilisation. Future research should explore the long-term impact of allergy specialist care on asthma control and quality of life, while also assessing potential barriers to accessing this care within underserved populations.
Abigail Craig, EMJ
Reference
Boyd M et al. Association of Allergy Specialty Care and Asthma Outcomes for Medicaid-Enrolled Children. J Pediatr. 2024;277:114361.
New Nasal Swab Test Holds Promise For Asthma Treatment
Diagnosing precisely what type of asthma a child has and fine-tuning the treatment for it involves an invasive procedure under general anesthesia. For children with mild asthma, it's just not worth the risks involved – or even ethical – to put them through the procedure, according to clinicians in the field.
That is why a new nasal swab test that can identify a child's subtype of asthma may transform the way the disease is treated, according to the University of Pittsburgh researchers who developed it.
MORE: Women are more likely to binge drink when their estrogen levels are high, study finds"Because asthma is a highly variable disease with different endotypes, which are driven by different immune cells and respond differently to treatments, the first step toward better therapies is accurate diagnosis of endotype," said Dr. Juan Celedón, chief of pulmonary medicine at UPMC Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh.
Asthma is the most common chronic childhood disease, affecting approximately 1 in 10 children, according to the National Institutes of Health. The disease, which has no cure, causes airways to constrict and sometimes produces excess mucus. It is generally classified as T-2 high, T-17 high and low low, based on cells that cause inflammation.
Celedón and his team collected nasal samples across three studies from 459 Puerto Rican and Black children, who have higher rates of asthma and are more likely to die from it than white children due to social inequities caused by structural racism, according to the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America.
The study, published Thursday in JAMA, found that 23% to 29% of the children had the T2-high subgroup, 35% to 47% had T17-high and 30% to 38% had low-low.
A potent type of new drugs called biologics target the immune cells that drive T2-high asthma, but no such medication exists for the other subgroups of the disease. The nasal swab test may now spur other areas of asthma research, Celedón said.
"One of the million-dollar questions in asthma is why some kids get worse as they enter puberty, some stay the same and others get better," Celedón said. "Before puberty, asthma is more common in boys, but the incidence of asthma goes up in females in adulthood. Is this related to endotype? Does endotype change over time or in response to treatments? We don't know. But now that we can easily measure endotype, we can start to answer these questions."
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