[Long-term drug therapy of bronchial asthma in childhood. Follow-up 1981-1983].

The effect of a long-term drug therapy in childhood asthma was investigated in all children seen in our outpatient clinic for the first time in 1981 and followed over the next two years. The drug schedule consisted of a step-wise increasing medication with regard to severity and form of bronchial asthma. Most children of grades II to IV improved during the study period. Children with rarely occurring episodes of asthma (grade I) received therapy only during asthmatic episodes and did not improve. The results of this study are discussed with respect to the natural course of the disease and immunotherapy (hyposensitization).