Sample Collections From the Airways of Asthmatic Patients

Completed

Conditions studied: Asthma

In brief

Fiberoptic bronchoscopy is a procedure which involves passing a pencil-thin tube into the lung in order to collect fluid and cells from the airways. Fiberoptic bronchoscopy can collect cells from the walls of airways by gently brushing them (bronchial brushing). In addition, squirting small amounts of sterile water in to the airway and gently suctioning it back into the bronchoscope (bronchoalveolar lavage) collects cells. In this study, researchers plan to perform these tests on patients with asthma and normal volunteers. This research may help to improve the understanding of the processes involved in airway inflammation and asthma.

Key facts

Study ID

NCT00001888

Run by

National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI)

People needed

574

Starts

1999-06-02

Last updated by the study team

2026-08-07

Who can join

Age: 18 and older, up to 75. Sex: any. Healthy volunteers: not accepted.

You may not qualify if…

• ASTHMATICS:
• Diagnosis of a pulmonary disorder other than asthma (e.g., chronic bronchitis, cystic fibrosis, HIV-related lymphocytic airway inflammation).
• History of drug or alcohol abuse within the past year.
• Positive test for human immunodeficiency virus (to exclude patients with HIV-related lymphocytic airway inflammation) or hepatitis virus.
• INCLUSION CRITERIA - RESEARCH VOLUNTEERS:
• Research volunteers undergoing a research bronchoscopy will be between 18 and 75 years of age, male or female.
• A negative inhalational methacholine challenge as defined by the absence of a 20% decrease in FEV1 at a PD20 dose of > 400 microgram (normal bronchial hyperresponsiveness). Methacholine challenge testing will not be performed if the subject has a history of allergy to methacholine. Results of testing performed by the subject s primary care provider may be accepted as evidence of a negative methacholine challenge.
• For women of childbearing potential, negative pregnancy test within 2 weeks prior to bronchoscopy and willingness to adhere to reliable birth control methods prior to bronchoscopy or sputum induction.
• Research volunteers who will only be providing research blood specimens, nasal epithelial lining fluid, sputum, spontaneously expectorated sputum, or exhaled breath condensate, and will not be undergoing a research bronchoscopy or sputum induction, may be included in the protocol without documentation of a negative inhalational methacholine challenge or a negative pregnancy test if they provide a history that they do not have asthma and that they are not currently pregnant, for women of childbearing age.
• EXCLUSION CRITERIA - RESEARCH VOLUNTEERS:
• Same as the asthmatic exclusion criteria plus a history of asthma.

Where it is running

• National Institutes of Health Clinical Center — Bethesda, Maryland, United States

Full record on ClinicalTrials.gov

Trial information comes from ClinicalTrials.gov and is refreshed daily. TrialsForMe does not provide medical care and does not run the studies it lists.