Abstract
We have investigated whether low birth weight (LBW) influenced the severity of bronchial asthma (BA) by a retrospective case control study.We chose 15 LBW children (1500≤ birth weight <2500g) with BA visiting our hospital as the case group, and chose 2 BA children to each case as the control group (total 30 children) on the basis of following criteria: 1) the same age at the first visit to our hospital and 2) birthday was almost same, 3) he/she attended our hospital at 8 years old, 4) birth weight was more than 2500g.There were no significant differences in the asthma severity at the first visit between the case group and the control group, but the symptoms at the age of 8 were significantly more severein the LBW group than in the control group (p<0.01).Inhaled corticosteroid was used in 8 out of 15 patients in the LBW group, although 4 out of 30 in the control group (p<0.01). These results suggest that LBW is a risk factor for the severity of BA.
