Bronchial asthma: improved lung function after behavior modification.

A systematic, controlled study of psychological desensitization treatment for asthma is described. Relaxation training alone was compared with a combination of relaxation training and either of two types of desensitization in terms of their effect on lung function. In patients receiving steroids, desensitization was significantly more effective than relaxation alone, leading to objective pulmonary function improvement in more than half the patients in the study group. In patients not receiving steroids, treatment was less effective, and there were no significant differences among the treatments.