Patent ID: 8053199

Claim:
A method of differentiating severe asthma from non-severe asthma in an individual, comprising: obtaining a respiratory fluid sample from the individual; determining the expression of cytokines comprising IL-1Ra, MIP-1a, MIG, IL-15, IL-2R, IP-10, IL-4, IL-6, MCP-1, and IL-2 at the protein level in the sample by means of ELISA; and performing statistical analysis to compare the expression level of each cytokine with corresponding expression level of said cytokine in reference sample obtained from a reference non-severe asthmatic population, wherein statistically significant reduced expression levels of IL-1Ra, MIP-1a, MIG, IL-15, IL-2R, IP-10, IL-6, MCP-1, and statistically significant increased expression levels of IL-4 and IL-2 in the sample from the individual compared to the corresponding expression levels in the reference sample indicates that the individual has severe asthma.