NEW YORK, Dec 02 (Reuters Health) -- Children with asthma who live in damp homes are more likely to experience nighttime wheezing and shortness of breath, a study suggests. Youngsters with asthma were more than five times as likely as other asthmatics to have bronchial hyperreactivity -- a constriction of airways in response to factors that are harmless in other children -- if they lived in a damp house, according to a report in the December issue of the journal Thorax.
"This risk is only partly explained by exposure to house dust mite antigen," wrote Dr. Thomas Nicolai and colleagues in the pediatrics department at the University of Munich in Germany.
The researchers identified 234 asthmatic children, average age 10. Three years later, 155 of the youngsters were reexamined. Of this group, 55 had persisting asthma symptoms.
"Children whose symptoms were triggered by allergen exposure and children with 'damp' homes were more likely to have (bronchial hyperreactivity) in adolescence," according to Nicolai and colleagues.
Adolescents were more than five times as likely to have bronchial hyperreactivity if their asthma was triggered by allergens, and more than 16 times as likely if they live in a damp home. Nighttime wheezing and shortness of breath were also linked to dampness in the home.
Houses that were damp contained higher levels of house dust mite allergen, a byproduct of the tiny arachnid that can infest homes. However, even after taking that factor into account, dampness was still a risk factor for bronchial hyperreactivity.
Home dampness, the researchers conclude, "is a significant risk factor for the persistence of bronchial hyperreactivity and respiratory symptoms in children with asthma."
SOURCE: Thorax 1998;53:1035-1040.
