Efficacy of Speleotherapy on Atopic Bronchial Asthma in Children

Abstract

Objective: Despite stunning advances in drug treatment, the present modern drugs that are used in the treatment of bronchial asthma don’t always achieve complete control over the disease. It may be useful to get support from complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) in such cases. CAM is understood as a non-traditional treatment, one of the varieties of which is speleotherapy. With the purpose of studying the therapeutic effect of speleotherapy in children, a treatment of speleotherapy was conducted for 50 children and adolescents suffering from atopic bronchial asthma. Materials and Methods: To evaluate the effectiveness of speleotherapy, the following research methods were used: Spirometry method was used to assess the ventilation function of the lungs, nitric oxide in exhaled air was measured for the assessment of airway inflammation, and laboratory examination of patients were evaluated including Interleukin (IL)-5, IL-13 and Interferon-gamma (IFN-γ) in serum by using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Results: As a result of the speleotherapy, patients improved their external respiratory function. The study also showed a positive impact with speleotherapy on exhaled nitric oxide and cytokine parameters in children with mild and moderate atopic bronchial asthma. Conclusion: Speleotherapy, as a method of medical rehabilitation for patients with bronchial asthma, leads to a decrease in the number of attacks, reduces the use of bronchodilators, and improves the indicators of the function of external respiration.

Keywords

• Allergy
• asthma
• children
• nitric oxide
• speleotherapy
• spirometry

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