Is spirometry essential in diagnosing asthma? Yes

Asthma is a disease that is often hard to diagnose because many patients have no signs or symptoms and have a normal lung function between attacks. Impaired lung function during a histamine challenge test is the reference test, but is not acceptable to many patients, especially to children. A history of certain symptoms also has sufficient diagnostic value for the diagnosis of asthma. Both the British and Dutch guidelines allow indication of a diagnosis of asthma without further additional testing when certain signs and symptoms are present.1,2 So for these patients spirometry …