Toward personalization of asthma treatment according to trigger factors

Asthma is a severe and chronic disabling disease affecting more than 300 million people worldwide. Although in the past few drugs for the treatment of asthma were available, new treatment options are currently emerging, which appear to be highly effective in certain subgroups of patients. Accordingly, there is a need for biomarkers that allow selection of patients for refined and personalized treatment strategies. Recently, serological chip tests based on microarrayed allergen molecules and peptides derived from the most common rhinovirus strains have been developed, which may discriminate 2 of the most common forms of asthma, that is, allergen- and virus-triggered asthma. In this perspective, we argue that classification of patients with asthma according to these common trigger factors may open new possibilities for personalized management of asthma.