What Are the Choices in Asthma Treatment?
Jul 31st, 2009 Posted in disease | no comment »Asthma is a chronic disease that affects the airways, the tubes that carry air in and out of the lungs. Asthma is a very serious and common disease, one that affects millions of people around the world. And the number of sufferers climbs continually.
Asthma cannot be cured, but most people with the disease are able to relieve their symptoms through various forms of asthma treatment. It can be controlled to a point where they are able to live quite normally and not suffer from constant asthma attacks.
Your best approach is to prevent an asthma attack from occurring in the first place. Find out the specific triggers for your symptoms and stay away from them. However, there will still be times when an asthma attack is unavoidable. Therefore, it’s critical that you learn how to manage an asthma attack.
Keep in mind that when it comes to asthma, not all attacks are the same. At times, your symptoms might be more severe than others. And in a severe asthma attack the airways can close up so much that not enough oxygen gets to the vital organs in the body. This is classified as a medical emergency. People can even die from severe asthma attacks. So if you are one of the millions of asthma sufferers you need to realize just how serious your condition is.
Usually, medication is used to control an asthma attack. It can help asthma sufferers keep their condition under control and ward off an attack before it becomes serious. Asthma medications can be taken orally or inhaled in vapor form using a metered dose inhaler.
Two kinds of medication are available that can be used to treat the condition. Bronchodilators help by reducing spasms. Anti-inflammatory medications reduce airway inflammation. If your asthma is particularly severe, your doctor may suggest that you use a combination of both.
These days there is a variety of prescription treatments that you can try:
*Accolade and Singulair, which are leukotriene inhibitors
*Serevent and Famoterol, long lasting bronchodilators, and
*Aminophylline or Theophylline.
Visit your physician to find out if these medications are right for you, or to explore natural asthma remedies.
