Descriptive statistics
A total of 158 children (125 with asthma and 33 age and sex-matched control subjects) with a median age of 10.2 years (range 6.0-17.0) were enrolled. Characteristics of the study groups are presented in Table 1. There were no significant differences between the children with asthma and control groups in terms of age, sex, body mass index and total IgE levels. The prevalence of aeroallergen sensitization was significantly higher in children with asthma and they had significantly higher blood eosinophil counts. Children with asthma had significantly higher periostin levels than controls (53.1 ± 13.1 vs 43.0 ± 11.2 ng/mL; p < 0.001) (Figure 1a).