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Individual approach encouraged for asthma, COPD treatment

ATLANTA — “Treat the patient and not the label,” was the message regarding pharmacologic therapies for patients with asthma and COPD during a presentation here.

“There’s a significant overlap between the physiology and pathophysiology in the inflammatory characteristics of asthma and COPD,” Stephen P. Peters, MD, PhD, FAAAAI, FCCP, FACP, FCPP, Thomas H. Davis Chair in Pulmonary Medicine and chief, Section on Pulmonary Critical Care, Allergy and Immunologic Diseases, Wake Forest School of Medicine, Center for Genomics and Personalized Medicine Research, Wake Forest School of Medicine, told Healio Allergy/Immunology. “They both have often bronchoconstriction and inflammation involved. The key to successful treatment is to target which elements are important in an individual patient, because they’re different from one patient to another.”

Stephen P. Peters

Peters said his objective was to define therapeutic options that may be applied to asthma and COPD. He included shared features of the two diseases, including airflow obstruction, as well as responsiveness of bronchodilators and inhaled steroids on various outcomes.

He reviewed the goals of asthma therapy and those of therapy for managing stable COPD, including bronchodilators and anti-inflammatory therapies in both diseases.

Peters said there is a need to identify exacerbation-prone patients with asthma and COPD.

He encouraged putting the concepts of chronic non-specific lung disease with symptoms (bronchospasm) and exacerbations (inflammation) into practice.

“Try to make the correct diagnosis, but treat the patient even if you can’t name the disease,” Peters concluded. — By Bruce Thiel

For more information:

Peters SP. Pharmacologic Interventions Shared With Asthma and COPD. Presented at: American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology Annual Scientific Meeting; Nov. 6-10, 2014; Atlanta.

Disclosure: Peters serves as a consultant with Aerocrine, Airsonett AB, Array Biopharma, AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, Experts in Asthma, GlaxoSmithKline, Merck, Ono, Pfizer, PPD Development, Quintiles, Saatchi & Saatch, Sunovion, Targacept and Teva. He has received research funding from NHLBI, American Lung Association, Actelion, Amgen, AstraZeneca, Boehringer Ingelheim, Centocor, Genentech, GlaxoSmithKline, Forest, Medimmune, Novartis, Sanofi and Teva.