Association between asthma control and bronchial hyperresponsiveness and airways inflammation: a cross-sectional study in daily practice.

Results When dividing patients into the three groups accord ing to their level of asthma control determined by ACQ [well-controlled asthma (ACQ score ≤ 0.75), borderline (0.75 < ACQ score < 1.5) and unc ontrolled asthma (ACQ score ≥ 1.5)], it appeared that uncontrolled asthmatics ha d a greater BHR to methacholine and sputum eosinophilia than controlled asthma ( P < 0.05, P < 0.001, respectively). By contrast, we failed to sho w significant differences in the FE N0 levels between the groups. With receiver-operating characteristic curves for differentiating uncontrolled (ACQ ≥ 1.5) from controlled and borderline (ACQ < 1.5) as thma, sputum eosinophilia and methacholine responsiveness were found to be more accurate than FE N0 (area under the curve: 0.72, 0.72 and 0.59, respectively). Conclusion In a broad spectrum of asthmatics encountered in cl inical practice, sputum eosinophilia and methacholine bronchial hyperresponsiveness, but not FE N0 , are associated with uncontrolled asthma.