How to Treat Asthma

Treating asthma can be an extremely frustrating process because of the nature of the disease. Just when you think that you've got your asthma under control a new attack can come along and remind you about your condition. Through proper treatment, however, most patients do eventually see a significant improvement of their asthma symptoms.

Instructions

1. Be prepared for a rescue situation. The very first thing that anyone with asthma needs to do is to get a fast acting inhaler for use when an asthma attack begins. Get a beta-agonist inhaler from your doctor and bring it with you always to make sure that you'll be ready to face your next asthma attack.

2. Get long-term medicine. There are many different types of long-term medicine available for asthma treatment, with new kinds coming out all the time. See your doctor and get a prescription for one of these medications to help prevent asthma attacks from starting in the first place.

3. Avoid your triggers. For many people, asthma is triggered by a certain stimulus that is recognizable. These stimuli may vary a great deal and include everything from stress to allergies, from certain foods to exercise. Whatever your trigger is, avoid it until your asthma is well controlled and you'll greatly reduce the incident of your asthma attacks.

4. Treat the underlying causes. If your asthma is exacerbated by allergies, get allergy shots to help improve the situation. If you're overweight and that's making things worse, don't just treat the asthma, also try to lose weight. In other words, if there's anything else you can do to help alleviate the root cause of your asthma, do that as well as taking your medicine.

5. Use a peak flow meter. Your doctor will give you a peak flow meter to use in order to measure the effects of your asthma attacks. Doing so, and recording the results, is a crucial part of really getting your asthma treated properly.

6. Stay in touch with your doctor. If you're having frequent asthma attacks then you need to stay in contact with your doctor and get things under control before you have a truly serious, life-threatening attack.

Tips & Warnings

• Long-term medicines for asthma treatment include corticosteroids, long-acting beta-agonists, leukotriene modifiers, cromolyn, theophylline, and nedocromil. It's a good idea to ask your doctor about all of these different medicines and to figure out which one, on combination, is best for you.

• Make sure that your rescue inhaler is always with you and that it isn't past its expiration date.

• If in doubt during an asthma attack, go to the emergency room and seek medical attention immediately.