Airway remodelling in asthma and novel therapy

Asthma is an airway inflammatory disease with functional and structural changes, leading to bronchial hyperresponsiveness (BHR) and airflow obstruction. Airway structural changes or airway remodelling consist of epithelial injury, goblet cell hyperplasia, subepithelial layer thickening, airway smooth muscle hyperplasia and angiogenesis. These changes were previously considered as a consequence of chronic airway inflammation. However, several studies have demonstrated that inflammation and remodelling can occur as separate but parallel aspects of the asthmatic process. As such there is increasing evidence for the role of mechanocompressive forces within the asthmatic airway contributing to airway structural changes. Furthermore, it is unclear what is the best treatment to modify remodelling and which component to target. There is also a need to identify asthma phenotype that might specifically respond to novel therapies such as anti-IL5, anti-IL13 and tyrosine kinase inhibitors.