Asthma phenotypes have been developed to address the complexities of the disease. A phenotype covers the clinical properties of the disease, but does not show the relationship to disease etiology and pathophysiology.
Different pathogenetic mechanisms might cause similar asthma symptoms and might be operant in a certain phenotype. These mechanisms are addressed by the term ‘endotype’.
Endotypes should link key pathogenic mechanisms with the asthma phenotype. The identification of molecular biomarkers for individual pathogenic mechanism underlying phenotypes is important. The accurate endotyping may predict treatment response.
References:
Untangling asthma phenotypes and endotypes. Agache et al. Allergy, Free full text review, Article first published online: 17 MAY 2012 DOI: 10.1111/j.1398-9995.2012.02832.x
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