Obesity and asthma: physiological perspective

Home of Kyle J. Norton for The Better of Living & Living Health Obesity is defined as a medical condition of excess body fat has accumulated overtime, while overweight is a condition of excess body weight relatively to the height. According to the Body Mass Index(BMI), a BMI between 25 to 29.9 is considered over weight, while a BMI of over 30 is an indication of obesity. According to the statistic, 68% of American population are either overweight or obese. Clinically Overweight and obesity are defined indicators of a disease process characterized by the accumulation of body fat due to an excess of energy intake (nutritional intake) relative to energy expenditure (physical activity)(a).
Obesity and asthma: physiological perspective
Obesity induces some pertinent physiological changes which are conducive to either development of asthma or cause of poorly controlled asthma state. According to the study by the Chest Research Foundation, Marigold Complex, Kalyani Nagar, obesity related mechanical stress forces induced by abdominal and thoracic fat generate stiffening of the lungs and diaphragmatic movements to result in reduction of resting lung volumes such as functional residual capacity (FRC). Reduced FRC is primarily an outcome of decreased expiratory reserve volume, which pushes the tidal breathing more towards smaller high resistance airways, and consequentially results in expiratory flow limitation during normal breathing in obesity. Reduced FRC also induces plastic alteration in the small collapsible airways, which may generate smooth muscle contraction resulting in increased small airway resistance, which, however, is not picked up by spirometric lung volumes. There is also a possibility that chronically reduced FRC may generate permanent adaptation in the very small airways; therefore, the airway calibres may not change despite weight reduction. Obesity may also induce bronchodilator reversibility and diurnal lung functional variability. Obesity is also associated with airway hyperresponsiveness; however, the mechanism of this is not clear. Thus, obesity has effects on lung function that can generate respiratory distress similar to asthma and may also exaggerate the effects of preexisting asthma(7).

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Sources 
(7) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23970905 http://medicaladvisorjournals.blogspot.com