Bronchial asthma, also termed chronic eosinophilic bronchitis, is a common inflammatory condition of the bronchial airway. Asthma has genetic inputs in both allergic and non-allergic phenotypes. Clinically, asthmatics have a hyperresponsive airway such that they develop classical clinical presentations of asthma–bronchospasm with some cough, wheeze, nocturnal wake ups, dyspnea with exercise, etc. Exposure to cold dry polar air, or muggy polluted summer air, are classic triggers for asthma. In all asthmatics, viral upper respiratory infections trigger bronchospasm. Physiologically, asthma is a disorder of bronchial obstruction, so pulmonary function tests (PFTs) are invaluable in diagnosis and management. The PFTs of asthmatics show reversible airflow obstruction to varying degree. The inflammatory infiltrate in asthma is multi-cellular with eosinophil leukocytes predominating both in the bronchial wall and in the blood. In recent years, anti-inflammatory and bronchodilator therapy has proved to be highly successful in the management of asthma.
Bronchial asthma medical expert witness specialties include allergy.