When you’ve got your asthma under control, you’ll breathe better and feel better. Your next goal is simple: to stay this way. As you’ve learned, asthma doesn’t just go away. Even with medication and a (mostly) trigger-free environment, an asthma attack is always possible.
Fortunately, you can prevent most attacks by monitoring your asthma. If you measure your breathing every day, you’ll know when to take extra medicine or to carefully avoid asthma triggers. An easy-to-use device called a peak-flow meter can help you measure your lung function. You’ll record your daily peak-flow measurements, as well as write down your asthma symptoms and medication in an asthma diary.
Most of the time, asthma doesn’t strike suddenly. In as little as a few hours or as much as a couple of days before wheezing starts, your body warn you that something is wrong. These early signs are your call to action. Over the years, my patients have found that a nagging cough, itchy throat, or general feeling of fatigue means an asthma attack is on the way. Your health care provider can help you spot your personal asthma warning signs. Then, you can design an action plan for responding to these signs. The trick is to be ready.
Being ready isn’t always easy, however. You may have a type of asthma that only occurs at certain times. In occupational asthma, for example, you only feel sick at work. You may be inhaling irritating substances like dust or vapors in carpeting, paint, and ventilation systems.
One common type of asthma is exercise-induced. Some people stop playing sports because they get too wheezy and out of breath. But you don’t have to sit on the sidelines. Olympic medal winners
Jackie Joyner-Kerse and Greg Louganis, for example, both have asthma. They, and hundreds of other athletes with asthma, prove that you can stay physically active.
No matter what type of asthma you have, changes in your general health can affect it. One important example is pregnancy. Asthma takes on new meaning if you’re pregnant or hope to become pregnant. Suddenly, it’s not just your disease anymore, it’s a condition that can affect your unborn child. If untreated, your asthma may prevent your baby from getting enough oxygen in the womb. You could experience complications, too, ranging from high blood pressure to a complicated labor. About a third of the time, women discover their asthma gets worse during pregnancy.
The good news is that you can safely treat your asthma while pregnant. Your health care provider will help you find the right medications. Meanwhile, you can avoid the triggers that launch your attacks. Just as important, you and your doctor can monitor your baby’s health during pregnancy, labor, and delivery. Moms-to-be who plan on breast-feeding can also learn whether asthma medication might affect their baby.
Once you’ve addressed the big concerns about living with asthma, you may still need strategies for dealing with asthma in everyday life. In some cases, your asthma management may need to change.
So far we’ve discussed what asthma means to you and other adults. But what does it mean to children and their parents? Today, more than 1 in 20 children have asthma. For them, asthma can be scary, embarrassing, painful, or just plain annoying. If your child has asthma, you can help by learning about the disease and how it affects kids. The drugs, equipment, and even attitude toward asthma tends to be different. Pediatric asthma could take up a book by itself.
In older adults, asthma can be hard to distinguish from other respiratory conditions. Infections and certain types of medication may trigger asthma attacks. If you’re an older adult, or if you have an elderly parent with asthma, your health care provider plays a more critical role than ever. Monitoring asthma requires regular check-ups at the doctor’s office, and asthma medication may need to change fairly often.
Whether you’re young or older, pregnant, athletic, working hard, or traveling, the message is the same: you can enjoy life without worrying that an attack of wheezing will sneak up on you.
