Nébulisation : quels médicaments utiliser ?

Aerosol therapy is a practice broadly utilised and currently in full expansion. From a technical point of view, nebulisation can be applied to a number of medications. The choice should be made in taking into account not only the therapeutic effects of the active ingredient but also equally the physico-chemical characteristics of the aerosol. These characteristics are dictated bythe nebulisation systems, that may be jet, ultrasonic or recently using vibrating mesh. The number of medications having Market Authorisation for nebulisation in France is restricted to ten. Off label use of medications is done under the responsibility of the prescriber; it should be done with products recognised in the literature, or by the experts, as being efficacious. The quality of the nebulisation system is defined by the size of the aerosol produced, the quantity of aerosol produced and the flow rate of the aerosol produced. The European norm EN13544-1, obligatory for all of the nebulisation systems, imposes upon the manufacturers to provide this information.