The Prevalence Rate of Atopic and Non-Atopic Asthma and Some Related Factors among Patients Referred to Asthma and Allergy Clinic

The prevalence of asthma and allergic diseases in the world has increased in recent decades, and it is necessary to identify allergens in different regions. The aim of this study was to evaluate the frequency of allergens in patients with atopic and non-atopic asthma in Dazyani Asthma and Allergy Clinic, Gorgan City, Iran in 2020.

This cross-sectional descriptive study was performed on 96 children with asthma aged 1 to 16 years. Diagnosis of asthma was based on the patient's clinical signs, life-saving medications used, activity limitation established, and pulmonary function tests. Accordingly, the definitive diagnosis of asthma was a 15% increase in forced expiratory volume-1 (FEV1) after inhalation of 2 puffs of salbutamol. Children were divided into two groups of atopic and non-atopic based on experiments. In this study, if immunoglobulin E (IgE) levels were high and Prick test was positive, they were in the atopic group, otherwise they were in the non-atopic group. Serum levels of eosinophils and immunoglobulin E were analyzed by type of asthma and severity of asthma.

Among the studied children, 54.17% had atopic and 45.83% non-atopic phenotype. A total of 71.78% of children with asthma were at least allergic to one of the allergens tested. There were also significant relationships between the severity of asthma and being atopic, immunoglobulin E, and eosinophil count.

Asthma is more severe in children with atopic asthma than non-atopic asthma. The mean of immunoglobulin E and eosinophils in atopic asthma is higher than non-atopic. Immunoglobulin E and eosinophil levels are also directly related to the severity of asthma.