Study of asthma drug finds it puts black patients at greater risk of death

• A large study on the popular asthma medication salmeterol has been halted after researchers uncovered fresh evidence that the drug may pose a slightly higher risk for respiratory and asthma-related deaths among black patients.
• More commonly known by its brand name, Serevent, the drug is a member of the beta agonist class of asthma medications, which treat asthma symptoms by relaxing inflamed airways.
• "The bottom line is that in a very large study in which salmeterol or a placebo was added to whatever treatment patients already were on, there was an increased number of severe asthma attacks, including fatal attacks," said study co-author Dr. Harold S. Nelson, a professor of medicine, allergy and immunology at the National Jewish Medical and Research Center, in Denver.
• For the years 1996 to 2003, Nelson and his colleagues assessed the harmful side effects of salmeterol among more than 26,000 males and females over the age of 12.
• All the participants were asthma sufferers already taking some form of asthma medication other than inhaled beta antagonists.
• In the year before the study, more than a quarter of the patients had visited an emergency room due to an asthma incident, and 8 percent had been hospitalized.
• Over a 28-week period, each patient was asked to use a salmeterol inhaler or a placebo inhaler twice daily as a supplement to their current drug regimen.
• In the January issue of Chest, Nelson and his associates report that white patients on either salmeterol or a placebo showed almost no difference in the number of life-threatening or fatal respiratory or asthma-related episodes.
• The researchers noted, for example, that blacks reported less corticosteroid use and higher hospitalization and emergency room visit rates due to asthma before the study started.
• Dr. Adam Wanner, a professor of medicine at the University of Miami, viewed the study as valuable but inconclusive.