• Asthma Quality of Life Questionnaire (AQLQ) [ Time Frame: After 4 weeks of intervention ] [ Designated as safety issue: No ]
  The Asthma Quality of Life Questionnaire (AQLQ) consists of 32 questions answered by subjects focused on asthma symptoms and ability to carry on activities of daily living. It is well validated, and frequently used in large clinical asthma studies as a primary endpoint. Changes of +/- 0.5 on this scale are considered clinically relevant.
  
  

• Airway reactivity as measured by Methacholine Challenge. [ Time Frame: After 4 weeks of intervention ] [ Designated as safety issue: No ]
  This is a physiological measurement derived from repeated breathing maneuvers which measures airway reactivity. Subjects are exposed to higher and higher concentrations of an airway irritant (in this case methacholine), and between each dose perform spirometry. The test is stopped after the forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV1) falls 20% below the baseline. The concentration of methacholine at which this occurs is called the PC20. Methacholine challenges are routinely used in the diagnosis of asthma, and in many asthma research studies to measure changes in airway reactivity.
  
  

Asthma is a chronic respiratory disease characterized by airway inflammation and airway hyperresponsiveness, which causes airflow obstruction. It is extremely prevalent, affecting an estimated 22 million Americans, and costly with loss of productivity and direct healthcare costs in the billions of dollars. The incidence and prevalence of asthma are increasing, both in the US and around the world. This increase comes despite greater understanding of the inflammatory and allergic basis for asthma, and despite better antiinflammatory medications. One explanation for the increasing prevalence of asthma is the concomitant increase in obesity, with the majority of Americans now overweight or obese. Numerous studies have convincingly linked asthma and obesity, and demonstrated increased obstruction with weight gain and decreased obstruction with weight loss. However, the mechanisms that underlie this linkage are not known.

We believe that low lung volumes contribute to the pathogenesis and severity of asthma. End-expiratory lung volume is decreased in obesity, and likely falls further during sleep, particularly in overweight and obese patients. Both upper and lower airway resistance increase with decreasing lung volumes, as airways become smaller. However, prior work has shown that lower airway resistance increases out of proportion to the decrease in lung volume that occurs during sleep in asthma patients. This difference between controls and people with asthma has not been further explored, yet may provide insight into asthma pathogenesis and provide potential targets for therapy.

Therefore, we propose a series of experiments to define the impact of lung volumes during sleep on airway resistance. One of these experiments will be to to test the hypothesis that lung stretch can be used therapeutically by tonically and dynamically increasing lung volumes during sleep using bi-level positive airway pressure. This research can help delineate asthma pathogenesis and may help improve therapeutic options in this exceedingly common disease.