WASHINGTON, Aug. 22 (Xinhua) -- Oral steroids are not effective for treating acute lower respiratory tract infections, or chest infections, in adults who don't have asthma or other chronic lung disease, according to a new study published in the U.S. journal JAMA Tuesday.
In the study, researchers at the Universities of Bristol, Nottingham, Oxford and Southampton in Britain randomly assigned 398 non-asthmatic adults with acute chest infections but no evidence of pneumonia and not requiring immediate antibiotic treatment into two groups.
One group involving 198 participants received 40 mg of the oral steroid called prednisolone for five days, and another received an identical placebo over the same time period.
The team found there was no reduction in the duration of cough, the main symptom of chest infections, or the severity of the accompanying symptoms between two and four days after treatment, when symptoms are usually at their most severe, in the prednisolone group compared with the placebo group.
The results suggested that steroids are not effective in the treatment of chest infections in non-asthmatic adult patients.
"Chest infections are one of the most common problems in primary care and often treated inappropriately with antibiotics. Corticosteroids, like prednisolone, are increasingly being used to try to reduce the symptoms of chest infections, but without sufficient evidence," lead author Alastair Hay, professor of primary care at the University of Bristol, said in a statement.
"Our study does not support the continued use of steroids as they do not have a clinically useful effect on symptom duration or severity. We would not recommend their use for this group of patients," Hay said.
"Oral and inhaled steroids are known to be highly effective in treating acute asthma as well as infective flares of other long-term lung conditions but need to be used carefully because of the risk of unwanted side effects," Professor Mike Moore, a study co-author from the University of Southampton, added.
"We chose to test the effect of steroids for chest infections as some of the symptoms of chest infections, such as shortness of breath, wheeze and cough with phlegm, overlap with acute asthma. However, we have conclusively demonstrated they are not effective in this group of patients."
