7 Healthcast: Asthma patients and research

 A local hospital hoping their research could provide better treatment and maybe even a cure.

Asthma is on the rise, up more than 10 percent in the last ten years.

”There are four to five thousand people a year who die from asthma and so it’s really important to get this disease under control,” said Dr. Eliot Israel, Brigham and Women's Asthma Research Center.

Theresa Cincotta, 56, of Somerville is battling the disease.

“I first started to get asthma when I was 30-years-old,” said Theresa Cincotta, asthma patient. “I couldn't even like get excited without coughing all the time and I had to have my spray with me at all time. It was really difficult for me for the first few years that I had it.”

Medical experts aren't really sure what causes asthma.

But doctors at Brigham and Women's Asthma Research Center are hoping that with new studies and trials, they can get some solid answers.

They are hoping to develop alternative methods and different medicines to help asthma patients.

“I think the treatments are really going to depend on people being willing to participate in research so that we can actually come up with better treatments,” said Dr. Israel.

Theresa is taking part in the trials. But for now, she concentrates on recognizing the warning signs of an attack.

“So I know the triggers, I don’t even use curtains in my house because anything that dust can cling to will trigger my asthma,” said Cincotta.

She hopes the asthma research will provide her with a better future.

“I just feel that I’m gonna have asthma for the rest of my life, and I feel like five years from now, by me participating, I'm probably helping myself in the future,” said Theresa Cincotta.

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