Anti Asthma Drugs

Advair Diskus Asthma Inhaler

Thousands of people succumb to asthmatic attack and lose their precious lives every day. Mind you, these are not young children, but young adults who have lived with asthma for a long time. Asthma is a long term chronic disease. You cannot cure the condition but you can control it. Controlling of the condition calls for monitoring one′s condition as well as taking precautions, avoiding trigger factors and making lifestyle changes. To combat asthma, you will need to work as a team with your doctor.

Lot of attention has been paid in developing treatment protocols to effectively control and deal with asthma in the recent years. There are highly effective drugs like Advair Diskus that help fight and control the disease and to reduce the inflammation. But then you might wonder why people do die of asthmatic attack.

What many people do not realize that asthmatic patients could die not due to the attack but due to their lack of awareness and reporting of facts and symptoms to their doctors. Lack of awareness and education about Asthma and COPD related conditions and their triggers etc can hinder effective treatment. In many cases doctors get to see the visible symptoms of the patients only when the patients are admitted to the hospital on emergencies. Lack of adequate medical history can cause a problem while administering the effective treatment to control asthma.

Advair Diskus⇒ for example can interfere with other medications like ritonavir and Kaletra or other anti HIV drugs. In cases when the patient is suffering from acute asthmatic attack, it is important that he informs the doctor about all of the other meditations including vitamins, supplements as well as other non prescriptive medicines that he is using for other ailments.

Advair Diskus is not to be administered to pregnant and lactating mothers. If a patient has heart ailments or suffers from hypertension, thyroid problems or any other conditions, it becomes important for the doctors to take cognizance and draw up the treatment protocol accordingly.

Patients who suffer from asthma should be very observant and watchful of all the symptoms and reactions that they go through before, during and after the attack. They can help the doctors control the inflammation by following the prescription and the advice religiously without fail. If the doctor prescribes Advair Diskus to be inhaled twice daily, it is important to follow the orders strictly. Care should be taken to ensure that the patient does not exceed the limit given by the doctor for any over dosage can cause problems instead of providing solution. If the patient develops any adverse reaction to Advair Diskus, he should seek doctor′s intervention immediately. Many times the reactions can be in the form of nausea, headache, breathlessness and heaviness of chest etc. These symptoms are likely to be ignored normally by the people. But then asthmatic people cannot afford to ignore such events and should be meticulous in reporting to the doctor as soon as possible.

Following carefully the doctor′s advice and educating oneself about the disease as well as treatment can help the patients equip themselves better to fight Asthma and avoid such serious complications. Education and awareness building is the only way to help reduce the fatalities arising out of asthma related complications.

Asthma - Causes, Statistics

Asthma is a disease or rather a chronic lung disease which is quite common and has long term effects, which is usually triggered as a result of smoke, allergens and even harmless things like exercise. During an asthma attack, the bronchial tubes in the lungs or in the airways tend to get inflamed which causes sensitivity in them, resulting in them responding more to environmental triggers like the smoke, dust, pet dander and cold air.

During an asthma attack, the muscles which lie around the respiratory tubes get stressed, making the lining swell up and get inflamed which results in the airways producing mucus in excess, causing extreme difficulty to the sufferer in breathing.

Asthma Prevalence statistics

Asthma, being common, according to statistics, had 24 million people being affected by it in the year 2014 in the United States. This roughly translated to 7.7 % of the US population. And of the total number of people, the number of adults suffering from Asthma measured almost 18 million.

And the worst part is, nearly 1.8 million cases happened to be the emergency cases with Asthma causing death in nearly 3600 cases in the US. Globally, the number of people being affected by asthma lay in the range of 235 million (as per numbers given by WHO)

What are the Causes for Asthma?

The Exact cause of Asthma till date is unknown, but as per scientists a combination of environmental and genetic factors in individuals results in asthma. Simply put, if your parent has Asthma, there is a higher probability of you suffering from the same.

It is also quite likely that you will suffer from Asthma if you tend to have an atopic syndrome. Basically, allergies and asthma tend to go together. Asthma is also a case for people suffering from respiratory infections either during their infancy or during their childhood.

Asthma is also the case in children whose mothers, while being pregnant were exposed to some form of allergens or some form of smoke.

Allergic Asthmas

The condition which goes by the name allergic asthma, usually happens because of the reaction between the immune system and the harmless substances of the environment which results in the release of antibodies which go by the name immunoglobulin E. And these antibodies tend to cause release of chemicals which produces some form of swelling in the lungs. The most common type of allergens associated with asthma include:

• Mold
• Cockroaches
• Fungi or some form of Pollen
• Household dust mites
• Urine, saliva, feces, hair and the skin flakes of humans or animals

Asthma resulting out of exercises

While exercising, around 90 % of the people who already suffer from asthma will experience some form of obstruction in their airflow.

EIB, as it is known as, affects not just those suffering from Asthma, but also might be triggered in case of people with a poor diet or those in a poor shape. And EIB is usually caused as a result of cold and dry air, pollution, cigarette smoke, pollen and the cases where there was a recent asthma attack.

Other Triggers of Asthma

Some of the other triggers of Asthma include:

• Airborne irritants, like smoke which might arise out of burning wood/charcoal or cigarettes, vehicle exhaustions, industrial emissions etc.
• Certain foods & food additives
• Anxiety and depression and high degree of stress
• Respiratory infections

Asthma attacks

As we move forward and make great leaps in the fields of science and technology, our life styles are changing for the better. Is it really for the better, we wonder. True that the modern lifestyle has reduced manual labor to a large extent, given us respite from hard work and given us more time on hand to pursue our interest. But then, we also see that our urban lifestyles are getting complicated day by day. People are not living a free and happy life. The fast paced life ruled by technology is taking its toll on the human psyche. People are either becoming automatons or living a city life that is filled with anxiety, stress, competition and other lifestyle problems. It is but natural that these maladies will emerge in the form of health problems like migraine, depression, anxiety disorders as well as chronic diseases such as asthma, diabetes, BP, obesity related disorders and so on.

Asthma is said to be one of the hidden and chronic diseases that is afflicting people of all ages and all over the world. Many people including youth suffer from asthmatic attacks and other respiratory diseases for a number of years or lifelong. Asthma attacks can be mild and can turn serious and fatal in a matter of few hours. Like in the cases of other lifestyle diseases, asthma as a condition needs to be managed and controlled but not cured.

Medical experts believe that asthma is caused due to genetic disposition of the individuals. However the environmental factors and the allergens as well as pollutants too contribute as triggers and aggravators of asthmatic attacks in patients. In terms of treatment of asthma, there are several approaches that have been adopted by the medical community. Short term and fast acting treatment is prescribed to patients to control and provide immediate relief to the patients at the instance of asthmatic attack. The doctors advise asthmatic patients to always carry albuterol with the inhaler with them all the time. In case of asthmatic attack, albuterol can effectively provide relief within fifteen minutes by relaxing the muscles and freeing the air passage to fecilitate free breathing and remove chest congestion. Albuterol is the first line of treatment prescribed by the doctors in all cases. Apart from the short term treatment option involving albuterol, the doctors advise long term medication in the form of Corticosteroids and Long acting beta-adrenoceptor agonists. For emergency relief, doctors use intravenous treatment involving magnesium sulfate etc.

Apart from following medication as prescribed by the doctor, the asthma patients should also explore holistic treatment options and lifestyle changes in order to enhance the quality of their life as well as to be able to prevent the asthma attacks. The approach should be to focus and be prepared with medication to combat asthma attacks and control the disease and at the same time to prevent the onset of asthma by removing the factors that act as aggravators and also by building or strengthening body immunity.

Yoga offers excellent options for relaxing and strengthening the respiratory muscles, in increasing the quality and quantity of breathing, removing toxins from the body and building body immunity to be able to resist the allergies and prevent asthma attacks.