Efficacy Determination of Azithromycin and Prednisolone Protocol Treatment in Refractory Asthma

Introduction. The prevalence of active asthma in Iran is between 2.8%-3.8%. A lot of treatments exist for acute and chronic asthma. The goal of chronic asthma treatment is achieve to a condition without any symptoms with a good function of lung by using the lowest dose of drugs. The aim of this survey is comparing the rate of clinical recovery and lungs function finding in persist asthma patient before and after treatment.Material and Methods. We conducted a prospective self-control clinical trial and enrolled 30 persistent asthma patient who came to lung clinics of Baqiyatallah(a.s) hospital. In the six month of 2007. By using history, physical exams, spirometry and completing questionary. Then patient treat by azithromycin protocol and prednisolone Results. The mean age was 44.36±25.8 years old. The mean BMI of patient was 25.8±4.2kg/m2. Twelve patients(40%) were male and 18 patients(60%) were female. The mean of FVC percent before and after treatment with full dose were 68.03±18.03 and 70.69±14.44 respectively (p<0.226) and after treating by Azithromycin&prednisolone was 81.61±20.1(p<0.004). The mean of FEV1 percent before and after treatment with full dose were 56.69±20.45 and 60.37 ±17.2 respectively(p<0.085) and after treating by Azithromycin & prednisolone was 79.58±16.9(p<0.0001). the mean of FEV1/FVC before and after treatment with full dose were 66.78±12.15 and 66.97±12.6 respectively (p<0.446) and after treating by Azithromycin&prednisolone was 78.11±11.08(p<0.0001). Discussion. We use Azithromycin instead of increasing the dose of prednisolone because patient didn’t show a good response to full dose and the response was good. In spite of lack of control group for Azithromycin treatment, this survey shows that instead of increasing the dose of prednisolone we can use Azithromycin.