What should I do about asthma?

Written by Yuan Qing
Pulmonology
Updated on December 06, 2024
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The full name of asthma is bronchial asthma, which is a chronic inflammatory disease of the lungs involving various inflammatory cells. The main symptoms of asthma include wheezing, shortness of breath, chest tightness, and coughing, which typically occur in the early morning and at night. These symptoms can subside on their own through medication treatment or even without medication. Thus, by diagnosing asthma, it is understood that asthma is a chronic inflammatory disease of the airways. After contracting this disease, the main treatment involves inhaling medications for asthma to control its symptoms. Additionally, if the asthma is caused by an allergic condition, such as an allergy to certain foods or airborne allergens like pollen and dust mites, it is advisable to first avoid these allergens to ensure a clean air environment, and then control or eliminate the symptoms with medication treatment. (Please use medication under the guidance of a professional doctor.)

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Written by Han Shun Li
Pulmonology
32sec home-news-image

Symptoms of asthma

Asthma is a common respiratory disease. What are the symptoms after the onset of asthma? Typically, asthma patients exhibit characteristic symptoms, including episodic chest tightness, wheezing, and difficulty breathing, often accompanied by a wheezing sound. The breathing difficulty usually manifests as difficulty exhaling. However, some asthma patients show atypical symptoms, possibly presenting only with coughing or chest tightness, known as cough-variant asthma.

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Written by Wang Xiang Yu
Pulmonology
1min 14sec home-news-image

Can asthma be cured?

So far, there is no known cure for bronchial asthma, and it is estimated that curing asthma within the next ten or twenty years will be very challenging. Therefore, any methods or medications claimed to treat or cure bronchial asthma found on any search engine cannot be trusted. We often encounter many people who, influenced by various advertisements, such as flyers, television, and even some newspapers, take medications containing powders that may control asthma temporarily. However, this can increase the risk of future control issues and cause many adverse reactions. Through these reactions, we can infer that these may contain oral steroids. Although oral steroids can indeed be used to control asthma, their use is subject to strict indications, and they are generally not the first choice for asthma control. Therefore, if you have asthma, you must seek standard treatment in a qualified hospital instead of self-medicating through any means, as this is inadvisable.

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Written by Wang Xiang Yu
Pulmonology
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How to cure asthma completely

How can asthma be completely cured? First, we need to understand what type of disease asthma is. Currently, most references to asthma pertain to bronchial asthma. Whether allergic, cough variant, or chest tightness variant, so far, no method has been found to completely cure bronchial asthma. It is also predicted that it will be difficult to find a cure for asthma within the next ten or twenty years. Therefore, once diagnosed with bronchial asthma, it is crucial to deeply understand this disease and learn to accept the reality that asthma cannot be completely cured at this point. It is also important to recognize that asthma can be managed. Asthma can only be controlled, not cured. Any advertisement claiming to cure asthma through any means is false and not trustworthy. Moreover, in our practical experience, we often encounter many asthma patients who, through various channels such as search engines, television, newspapers, or magazines, find advertisements for medications claiming to cure asthma. However, in practice, although these patients may find their bronchial asthma symptoms well controlled in the short term after taking these medications, the symptoms of bronchial asthma recur repeatedly after stopping the medication, becoming increasingly difficult to control. Furthermore, some asthma patients who have taken these medications often develop typical drug-induced conditions, such as Cushing's syndrome or drug-induced diabetes. We suspect that these medications likely contain oral steroids. Oral steroids can indeed be used to treat asthma, but their use in the standardized treatment of asthma is governed by very strict guidelines. Therefore, patients with bronchial asthma must not be misled by these false advertisements, otherwise, the consequences could outweigh the benefits.

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Written by Wang Xiang Yu
Pulmonology
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Do people with asthma cough?

The asthma commonly referred to is bronchial asthma, which is primarily characterized by recurrent episodes of breathing difficulty. This difficulty in breathing is mainly manifested as chest tightness and shortness of breath. Additionally, asthma is often triggered by upper respiratory tract infections. Therefore, most asthma patients experience coughing and expectoration during acute attacks. There is also a special type of asthma known as cough variant asthma, which, as the name suggests, is primarily characterized by coughing. This type of cough is generally dry with little to no sputum, or it involves a small amount of mucous sputum. The coughing can occur during the day but is generally more pronounced at night.

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Written by Wang Chun Mei
Pulmonology
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Is variant asthma allergic asthma?

Cough-variant asthma is not allergic asthma, although it is a type of allergic asthma. Generally speaking, there is a certain distinction between cough-variant asthma and allergic asthma. Clinically, cough-variant asthma is a special type of asthma, where the main symptom exhibited by patients is an irritative dry cough, typically quite severe, without other significant clinical discomforts. In contrast, patients with allergic asthma usually exhibit symptoms such as sneezing, nasal congestion, runny nose, itchy eyes, and itchy nose before the onset, triggered by exposure to certain allergens. Cough-variant asthma does not have these preliminary signs, marking a clear difference from allergic asthma.