الفهرس 
Bronchial AsthmaOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
An increasing body of literature suggests a connection between asthma, on one hand, and obesity and atherosclerosis on the other. It is increasingly recognized that obese people are more prone to develop asthma. The severity of asthma was also found to be greater among those in the overweight and obese groups. Multiple logistic regression models also revealed that asthmatic patients were more likely to have heart diseases than non asthmatics. Indeed, asthma has been reported in several studies to contribute to enhanced risk for atherosclerosis. A possible explanation for the association of asthma, obesity and atherosclerosis may be the fact that all these disorders share a common underlying pathology: inflammation.
Mast cells are inflammatory cells widely distributed throughout the body. Although they are best known for their actions in allergic reactions they are involved in many physiological processes of the body. Indeed, mast cells appear to play a pathophysiological role in different conditions, such as asthma, atherosclerosis and obesity.
Recently, a potential link between leukotrienes (one of the mast cells mediators) and atherosclerosis has been proposed. A cross link between asthma and atherosclerosis has received attention, given the finding that polymorphisms in the 5-lipoxygenase and 5-lipoxygenase–activating protein genes, 2 key genes in the regulation of leukotriene synthesis, predict a high risk for atherosclerosis.
Given this newly generated interest relating the pathophysiology of asthma to cardiovascular diseases and the proatherogenic role of leukotrienes together with the suggestions that anti-asthma medications may have some beneficial value in asthmatics with respect to cardiovascular diseases risk, new insights on the potential role of anti-asthma drugs on the atherogenic profile should be investigated especially in patients suffering from both diseases.