Asthma Facts
Asthma is much easier for you to deal with if you arm yourself with asthma facts. Learn about asthma and learn how to live a more normal life even if you suffer from asthma.
• Asthma and allergies strike about 25% of Americans. Roughly twenty million people in the United States have asthma. Facts also include: About nine million children under the age of 18 have asthma, and over four million children in the United States have had an asthma attack in the last year.
• Asthma facts include an inflammation of the bronchial airways that causes difficulty in breathing. If you are under treatment, that inflammation can be partially or totally reversible.
• Asthma affects each person differently. Each person reacts to a different degree to the stimuli around them, so each person will need medication tailored to their symptoms.
• Asthma is the most common of chronic illnesses in children. And overall, there are roughly five thousand deaths in the United States from asthma every year.
• Allergens that affect asthma sufferers include seasonal pollen, foods such as fish, peanuts and soy, pet dander and dust mites, and work-related allergens, including latex.
• Irritants that can tend to bring on asthma symptoms include respiratory infections, some drugs, smog and weather changes, tobacco smoke, GERD, hormones and other irritants.
• The usual signs and symptoms of asthma, facts conclude, are wheezing, chest tightness, coughing and shortness of breath. These symptoms, including the order they appear, will differ for each individual affected by asthma.
• An acute asthma attack comes on very suddenly, and is normally brought on by allergens, or by an upper respiratory infection. An acute attack, asthma facts point out, can be fatal, because it can continue to go on even after you have used your normal asthma medications. You should get to an emergency room as soon as you can, if your inhaler doesn't help the symptoms.
• Physicians prescribe various medications to control your asthma. Most are bronchodilators, which work by reducing inflammation or relaxing bronchospasm. Generally, inhaled medications work more effectively than pills or liquids, because they go directly to work on the airways.
• Medications that are similar to adrenaline have been developed, because adrenaline has too many undesirable side effects. The newer medications work on all the symptoms that adrenaline did, without the side effects. Some medications now work to dilate the bronchial airways, and corticosteroids work to improve lung function.
• Like many diseases and disorders, asthma can be controlled, to a degree, to help you live a more normal life. Asthma facts tell us that eating healthy foods, staying away from things that trigger your attacks, and living a healthy lifestyle can help you live with asthma without letting it control your life.