The NHLBI National Asthma Education and Prevention Program (NAEPP) has released the long-awaited Expert Panel Report 3 (EPR-3) Guidelines on Asthma.  The Guidelines emphasize the importance of asthma control and introduce new approaches for monitoring the disease.

The College has created a new patient education, Take Control: A Guide for People with Asthma, that explains the new asthma guidelines.   

Also available online are the press announcement of the new guidelines and the complete report.

The updated recommendations for managing asthma include an expanded section on childhood asthma, new guidance on medications, new recommendations on patient education in settings beyond the physician's office, and new advice for controlling environmental factors that can cause asthma symptoms. 

The Guidelines emphasize that, although asthma can be controlled, the condition can change over time and differs among individuals and by age groups. 

The Guidelines also address the following:

Assessment and Monitoring:  EPR-3 takes a new approach to assessing and monitoring asthma by using multiple measures of the patient's level of current impairment (frequency and intensity of symptoms, low lung function and limitations of daily activities) and future risk (risk of exacerbations, progressive loss of lung function or adverse side effects from medications).  The Guidelines stress that some patients can still be at high risk for frequent exacerbations even if they have few day-to-day effects of asthma.

Patient Education. EPR-3 confirms the importance of teaching patients skills to self-monitor and manage asthma and to use a written asthma action plan, which should include instructions for daily treatment and ways to recognize and handle worsening asthma.  New recommendations encourage expanding educational opportunities to reach patients in a variety of settings, such as pharmacies, schools, community centers and patients' homes. A new section addresses the need for clinician education programs to improve communications with patients and to use system-wide approaches to integrate the guidelines into health care practice. 

Control of environmental factors and other conditions that can affect asthma.  EPR-3 describes new evidence for using multiple approaches to limit exposure to allergens and other substances that can worsen asthma. Research shows that single steps are rarely sufficient. EPR-3 also notes that treating other chronic problems that asthma patients may have – such as rhinitis and sinusitis, gastroesophageal reflux, overweight or obesity, obstructive sleep apnea, stress, and depression – may help improve asthma control.