TY - JOUR T1 - Is there a place for anti-remodelling drugs in asthma which may not display immediate clinical efficacy? JF - European Respiratory Journal JO - Eur Respir J SP - 1 LP - 2 DO - 10.1183/09031936.04.00044304 VL - 24 IS - 1 AU - M. Inman Y1 - 2004/07/01 UR - http://erj.ersjournals.com/content/24/1/1.abstract N2 - Airway remodelling in asthma, like vascular remodelling in atherosclerotic disease, is thought to occur in response to repeated inflammatory insults, and ultimately contributes to the pathophysiology of the disease. In asthma, these structural changes are many, and include thickening of the airway wall, associated with loss of epithelial organisation, goblet cell hyperplasia, subepithelial fibrosis, increased vascularisation, fibroblast and myofibroblast proliferation, and smooth muscle hyperplasia and/or hypertrophy. Several of these structural changes are increasingly thought to play a role in airway dysfunction in asthma 1. While the concept that most, if not all, components of airway wall remodelling develop as a result of ongoing inflammatory events seems entirely plausible, direct support for this is relatively sparse in asthma literature. Moreover, this is not an easy issue to address experimentally, as by the time patients present to their physician and are diagnosed with asthma, they usually display markers of airway remodelling processes similar to those in patients with long-standing asthma 2. Thus, … ER -