Welcome to the Allied Health virtual journal club. For each journal club, a high yield article will be selected and various questions about the article will be presented.  After reading the article, please post answers to one or more of the questions OR post your own questions or discussion points for others to reply. The purpose is to create a discussion forum for our Allied Health Community. A link to the article will be provided, but let us know if you have any difficulties obtaining the article.

Article:

Kirings JG, McGregory MC, Bacharier, LB, Castro M. Biologics for serve asthma: Treatment-specific effects are important in choosing a specific agent. J Allergy Clin Immunol Pract 2019:1379-92. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31076056

Objectives:

1. Appreciate the increasing number of biological therapies being approved that directly alter the immunopathogenesis that leads to asthma and can have benefit that previous therapies did not.
2. Understand the mechanism of action, specific indications, and anticipated effects of each of the FDA approved biological therapies.
3. Appreciate the various phenotypes that a clinician may see in his or her clinic, such as patients with frequent exacerbations, fixed airway obstructions or corticosteroid resistance could influence his or her decisions in choosing among the only increasing number of biological therapies.  

Discussion Questions:

1. Describe basic epidemiology of asthma.
2. Discuss clinical manifestations of severe asthma.
3. How are phenotypes and endotypes determined?
4. Discuss pathobiology of T2 –High asthma.
5. Identify the patient with severe asthma who would be a candidate for biologic medication.
6. What are the characteristics of biologics that are FDA approved for the treatment of moderate to severe persistent asthma with a high T2 phenotype?