What Is Non-Allergic Asthma?

Dr. Carlos Camargo answers the question: 'What Is Non-Allergic Asthma?'

ByABC News
May 15, 2008, 2:55 PM

— -- Question: What is non-allergic asthma?

Answer: As you might guess, non-allergic asthma is asthma in someone who doesn't have allergies. And we can know this is in several ways. Allergies are things like allergic rhinitis or hay fever, and there are people who clearly do not have any of the different ways that allergies present.

There's also testing, and one approach is to use what's called a skin print test where many different allergens or substances that cause allergic reactions are given to the patient and we look for reactions to these tests. There's also blood tests which can measure specific compounds in the blood that show that the person has been exposed to this and developed a reaction to it, and can assist in describing whether or not the person has the potential for allergies.

So there's different ways to look at this, but there are clearly a subset of people with asthma who'd have negative blood tests, negative skin print tests, and no symptoms or signs consistent with an allergy. And this subset is referred to as non-allergic asthma.

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