Coping With Asthma (My Experience of Asthma)

Member Name: broksababe

Product:	My Experience of Asthma
Date:	01/02/01 (27 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: n/a

Disadvantages: n/a

Asthma to anyone that doesn't know is a life threatening condition that narrows the airways from your lungs, therefore making it hard to breathe.
I myself am asthmatic and my son also developed it at the age of 2.

Attacks can be very frightening especially for young children, my son used to turn blue and we had to rush him to hospital.

The worry with asthma is that you never know when it will strike; it can be triggered off with many things such as Allergies, including hay fever or smoke, tiredness or even over exertion. Plus I find it affects me when I get a cold, my chest always tightens up.

The warning signs for an attack or even someone who has never had it before are a persistent cough, which is a lot worse at night.
There are various medications that your doctor can prescribe to relieve the condition:

A reliever inhaler that you use to open the airways once an attack has started.
Or
A preventative inhaler that you use daily to strengthen the airways making you less prone to having problems.

These come in various forms, one for children that they can use with a spacer- a device that allows you to dispense the required amount of inhaler into a large plastic vessel and the child just breathes it in from a mask.

Adults either have a spray inhaler or a powder inhaler.

With these you should find that you should be able to lead a normal life and even do sports, however you should always make sure you have your inhaler with you at all times.

Occasionally you or your child may experience a serious attack, having had this myself all I can say is its very frightening, I felt like I was going to die and even the inhalers wouldn't help, I was rushed into hospital, put on a ventilator and treated with high does of steroid. This worked eventually after 2 or 3 days, but it's the worst attack I ever had and I didn't even dare go to sleep in case I suffoca
ted in my sleep.

I then purchased a nebuliser for home, this cost around £100, you put salmeterol solution into a chamber, place a mask over your mouth and switch on, this is a lot more effective for serious attacks and clears your airways quickly before the attack gets too bad.

It is quite noisy and frightening to a small child so you will need to introduce it gradually before the real attack.

This has been a gem, when my son developed it as it meant I could treat him at home and not have to worry about getting to the hospital every time he had an attack.

I recommend anyone who has it badly or a child with it to consider getting one even if just for peace of mind. I f you require any more information then ask me!

Summary: