Asthma: Symptoms and Treatments

Asthma: Symptoms and Treatments

Asthma is a disease associated with the lungs that cause difficulty in breathing because of inflammation of the airway. An asthma attack can be mild to very severe; it comprises of various common symptoms. Also, there are different classifications of asthma, such as allergy-induced asthma. Observing asthma symptoms and taking medical help at the right time is very important if you or any of your beloved ones have asthma. Treatments of asthma are result-oriented. Your doctor may suggest a treatment depending on how healthy your lungs are.

Common asthma symptoms

Asthma signs and symptoms are:

  1. Shortness of breath
  2. Pain in the chest due to muscle contraction
  3. Wheezing sound
  4. Trouble sleeping because of difficulty in breathing
  5. Coughing or wheezing attacks that worsen with time

Asthma Medications

There are two types of medications that include rescue medicines and long-term preventive medications.

Rapid Relief Inhalers

One can use these medicines to get rapid relief from symptoms. These inhalers help to relax muscles immediately and reduce inflammation in the airway. This drug helps to open them and makes it easy to breathe. In case if you are using such rapid relief inhalers two days a week, visit your doctor.

These are the common inhalers that help to control symptoms:

  1. Short-acting beta-agonists
  2. Anticholinergics
  3. Oral corticosteroids
  4. Combination quick-relief medicines

Long term preventative medicines for asthma

Inhaled corticosteroids: These are the efficient drugs that provide a long-term effect. These drugs or inhalers are not anabolic steroids, which people use to enhance muscles. Inhaled corticosteroids are budesonide (Pulmicort Flexhaler), mometasone (Asmanex Twisthaler), ciclesonide (Alvesco), and beclomethasone (Qvar RediHaler).

Inhaled long-acting beta-agonists: These inhalers help to open your airways by acting on the muscles and making them relaxed. Your doctor may suggest taking this medication along with an inhaled corticosteroid. The common inhaled long-acting beta-agonists are formoterol, salmeterol, and vilanterol.

Leukotriene modifiers: Leukotriene modifiers help to relax the smooth muscles in the airway and act to control inflammation. These are available in the form of pills and liquids. The leukotriene modifiers are available in the market. Montelukast (Singular), zafirlukast (Accolate), and zileuton (Zyflo) are a few examples.

Corticosteroids: For those for whom any asthma medicine does not work efficiently, then such a case their doctor might advise corticosteroids for a couple of weeks. This drug is available in pills and liquid form. This drug works as an anti-inflammatory agent that works to stop inflammation; and mucus production in the airways of a person who is undergoing an asthma attack. Regularly taking this medicine helps to make the airway less inflamed and less likely to respond to asthma triggers, which cause severe asthma symptoms. Therefore, these drugs are very efficient to control symptoms of asthma.

This information was all about asthma and its common treatments that are prescribed by a doctor. If you are experiencing any such mild, moderate, or severe symptoms, take experts’ help immediately. Asthma can occur at any time in life. However, this lung disorder is incurable. One can control asthma by taking the right care and regular medications depending upon the severity of the condition.

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