For decades, pills and inhalers have been the only treatment for people who suffer from asthma.

Now doctors in Houston are hoping their study will result in FDA approval of the first procedure that could spell relief for asthmatics.

There’s no major surgery or anesthesia involved in this groundbreaking treatment to clear the air for asthma sufferers.

In the aftermath of 9/11, Alvin Pieper was a Marine on duty, and a civilian volunteering his time at Ground Zero.

“I was hoping to find someone alive,” he said.

What happened there instead could haunt him the rest of his life.

“The first two days there weren’t any masks,” Pieper said.

Pieper developed breathing problems a week after 9/11. He was diagnosed with exercise induced asthma a few years later when he was activated by the Army National Guard to go to Iraq.

“They say my lung capacity is 70 to 80 percent of what it should be,” he said.

The 32-year-old is now leaving the military on a medical discharge.  His next mission will be to undergo a groundbreaking asthma treatment. 

Dr. William Lunn is part of an international study that uses a bronchoscope to get rid of the main reason asthma patients wheeze and get short of breath.

“The smooth muscle in the airway wall is too active it clamps down and makes breathing passages narrow,” Dr. Lunn said.

Using thermal energy, he will reduce the amount of smooth tissue and in effect, help patients breathe easier.

“The patients are then able to take just maintenance medication, and they’re not having to take rescue inhalers,” he said. “They can have a normal life.”

Researchers believe the effects of the treatment will last three to five years.

Pieper is hopeful it will get him off the couch and jogging again.