According to a research conducted at the National Jewish Medical and Research Center and a published study in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, black teens suffering from asthma tend to show a resistance to steroid treatment.

It was suggested during the study that inhaled steroids are effective for asthma control management. Joseph Spahn, M.D., a pediatric allergist and director of the Immunopharmacology Lab at National Jewish, said that asthma steroid therapy may be resisted by African-American children when compared with white children.

From News.Bio-Medicine.Org:

“Our results suggest that children with steroid-resistant asthma are more likely to be African-American, to have required treatment with oral steroids at an earlier age and to require larger amounts of oral steroids for only marginal control of their asthma,” said Joseph Spahn, M.D., a pediatric allergist and director of the Immunopharmacology Lab at National Jewish.

Other recent epidemiological studies have shown that blacks with asthma are sicker and have a higher mortality rate than whites with asthma. Doctors at National Jewish now are trying to determine whether blacks have a more vigorous immune response to airway inflammation–which means that higher doses of steroids must be used to control inflammation–or a poor response to steroids secondary to a genetic resistance to the drugs.

“The theory is that with ongoing airway inflammation you get worsening asthma and diminished steroid sensitivity,” Dr. Spahn said.

This study of 164 teen-agers treated at National Jewish also showed that 25 percent of the group was steroid resistant. Children with less than a 15 percent improvement in lung function following a “burst” of inhaled steroids–high doses over seven days–were considered steroid resistant.

“Twenty-five percent of the kids admitted to National Jewish have steroid-resistant asthma, which is much greater than anyone thought,” Dr. Spahn said.

It is believed that future studies may be oriented towards ascertaining if black teens have a more vigorous immune response to airway inflammation.