الفهرس 
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Abstract
Asthma is a chronic inflammatory disease characterized by recurrent attacks of breathlessness and wheezing, which vary in severity and frequency from person to person.
The level of neurotrophins has been observed to be increased in allergic diseases such as allergic rhinitis, atopic dermatitis and asthma. BDNF is a secretory protein belonging to the neurotrophin family, was shown to modulate eosinophil function & IgE production in asthmatic children.
This study was conducted to evaluate the serum levels of Brain-derived neurotrophic factor in children with bronchial asthma and the possible association with the disease severity.
This study was carried out at the Pediatric Allergic and Immunology Clinic of El-Minia University Children’s Hospital and El-Minia General Hospital between September 2015 and March 2016. Thirty five child aged ≥ 2 years, with a mean of 7.7± 2.2 years , with proved bronchial asthma were enrolled in the study. During the study period , Fifteen healthy children of matched age and sex were recruited from outpatient clinic as controls . Asthmatic patients in this study were subdivided into three groups based on the severity of the disease as follow :
group A : Mild persistent asthma (Fifteen children )
group B : Moderate persistent asthma (Ten children )
group C : Severe persistent asthma (Ten children )
All children were subjected to thorough clinical examination together with evaluation of BDNF serum levels by ELISA technique and complete blood count .
In the present study, our results showed that there was a highly significant increase in serum BDNF level (12.4 ± 17.4 ng/ml) in asthmatic cases compared to controls (3.3 ± 1.2 ng/ml) (p< 0. 01). Our results also showed that serum BDNF level was significantly higher in children with severe persistent asthma (33.2 ± 21.7 ng/ml) than in moderate persistent ashma (5.9 ± 1.1ng/ml) (p < 0.001), and mild persistent asthmatic cases (2.8 ± 0.9 ng/ml) (p < 0.001). Moreover, serum BDNF level was also higher in moderate persistent than in mild persistent asthmatic patients (p < 0.001).
On the other hand, there was no significant difference between mild persistent asthmatic cases and control group as regards serum level of BDNF (P >0.05).
Moreover there was a significant positive correlation between severity of disease and BDNF serum level (r = 0.69 , p < 0.001 ), peripheral blood counts of eosinophil (r = 0.91, p < 0.001), monocytes (r = 0.81, p < 0.001) and total leucocytic count ( r = 0.88 ,p < o.001 ).
In conclusion, high BDNF serum levels could be considerd as a marker for bronchial asthma and its clinical severity in children.