Outgrowing Childhood Asthma

"There are multiple epidemiologic studies that address the chances of spontaneous remission of childhood asthma. An important study from the University of Arizona at Tucson that began in 1980 followed 1246 subjects for 24 years with a 78% retention rate.[1] At the beginning of the study, approximately 50% of the children had wheezing. Approximately 20% had transient wheezing, 15% had late-onset wheezing after 3 years of age, and approximately 14% had persistent wheezing. An asthma predictive index was used to predict the risk of children who are wheezing at 2-3 years of age of experiencing persistent wheezing in the school-age years. The study found that children who had 1 major criteria, eczema or a family history of asthma, or 2 of 3 minor criteria, wheezing other than with colds, persistent rhinitis, or eosinophilia, had a 75% chance of having active asthma between 6 and 13 years of age, whereas 68% of the patients with negative index did not have asthmatic symptoms during the school-age years."