ABSTRACT
The natural history of childhood asthma has long been of concern to affected children and their parents, to clinicians caring for the children, and to researchers. Children with asthma and their parents ask whether the child will "outgrow" asthma, and clinicians need to be able to answer this question. Researchers have descriptively characterized the natural history of asthma and searched for factors determining prognosis. During adulthood, the former child asthmatic may be exposed to environmental agents, including cigarette smoke, that may adversely affect respiratory health; childhood asthma has been postulated to increase the risk for adverse effects of these exposures-a hypothesis that remains under investigation.
