Asthma control improves in Austrian severe asthma patients.

Introduction The GAN Severe Asthma Registry is a prospective registry recording clinical parameters. A recent article described the baseline characteristics of severe asthma patients of participating Austrian centers. This article assesses changes in asthma control and lung function in the annual follow-up visits. Methods We analyzed all patients included in the GAN Severe Asthma Registry from participating Austrian centers. Results Follow-up visit data of years 1 and 2 were available for 130 and 91 patients, respectively. Follow-up visits of years 1 and 2 showed a statistically highly significant (p<.001) increase in mean FEV1 (mL) compared to baseline. All improvements exceeded the minimal clinically important difference of 230 mL. Both median ACT and ACQ-5 improved well beyond the minimal clinically important difference of 3 points (p<.05) and 0,5 points (p<.001), respectively, in follow-up visits years 1 and 2 compared to baseline visit. Relevant improvements in lung function and asthma control were limited to patients receiving monoclonal antibody treatments. Severe asthma monoclonal antibody treatment increased from 60.7% at baseline visit to 71.8% and 73.9% at yearly visits 1 and 2, respectively. Smoking history negatively impacted improvement in asthma control, but not lung function. Presence of a measurable T2 signal at baseline had no impact on changes of either asthma control of lung function. Conclusions This study provides the first Austria-wide longitudinal investigation of severe asthma patients. Asthma control and lung function improved well at 1 and 2 years after baseline. This improvement can be mainly attributed to an increased rate in monoclonal antibody treatments.