Inhaled LABA's

Here's a link to a new meta-analysis (Annals of Internal Medicine) of LABA's + ICS vs. ICS alone. It's taken from the GSK database, and finds the significant increase risk to the addition of Salmeterol to ICS with regards to mortality, asthma hospitalization, or asthma exacerbation.

Contradicts the findings from the Salpeter meta-analysis and from SMART (which I did not think were very compelling to begin with). So, any thoughts? Does this affect management of patients with asthma?

Here's the link to the paper and it's editorial:

http://www.annals.org/cgi/content/abstract/0000605-200807010-00229v1?papetoc


http://www.annals.org/cgi/content/full/0000605-200807010-00230v1?papetoc