[Severe bronchial asthma].

The term 'difficult-to-treat asthma' indicates that the asthma is not sufficiently controlled despite prescription of high doses of asthma medication. The term 'severe asthma' is used when the asthma is still insufficiently controlled after exclusion or treatment of any complicating factors; an important complicating factor is poor compliance. Recent studies have focused on the heterogeneous character of asthma and on the definition of specific phenotypes, with the aim of developing phenotype-specific treatments.