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JACI Highlights - September 2005
Rhinovirus infections in infancy may predict development of persistent wheezing
Viral respiratory tract infections associated with wheezing are common during infancy and early childhood. Since wheezing is a common symptom associated with asthma, parents of wheezing preschool children often ask "does my child have asthma now, and/or will my child develop recurrent wheezing or asthma later in childhood?" In the September 2005 issue of the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, Lemanske et al report for the first time that outpatient moderate to severe respiratory tract illnesses during infancy due to "common cold" viruses, rhinoviruses, are the most significant predictors of which children will go on to develop persistent wheezing in later childhood. Rhinovirus infections occur more commonly in fall and spring, and their findings convincingly demonstrate that 63% of infants who wheezed during these seasons continued to wheeze in the third year of life compared to only 20% of all other infants. Thus, infants who wheeze with respiratory infections during rhinovirus seasons should be followed closely during early childhood so that therapy can be instituted both acutely and/or or chronically that may help reduce the frequency and/or severity of any future wheezing episodes.
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