Asthmatics Anonymous, Because I'm really fed up :P Options

[Misti]

I'm suddenly very glad my asthma is only mild (it only really bothers me when exposed to pollen/dust/dustmtes/fog/extremecold/exercise etc). I still get regular sleepless nights though, but thank goodness have never closed up completely!

Moving house hasn't been much fun, as the place wasnt very clean when I moved in and still isn't. I had to dig out my steroid inhaler and start using it again! Things are settling down now, but I still need to launder all the curtains as I start coughing etc every time I open and close them at the moment!

Unfortunately I couldn't persuade my housemates to buy me a Dyson this time, but getting and using a decent vacuum cleaner has also been helping.

Many sympathies for those who have it even worse!

[piano*singing*lover]

Hey guys!
This is pretty much just a moan, but does anyone else with asthma notice that whenever you get a cold you always get a chest infection to follow?
This has got to be my 6th chest infection this year! The asthma too has steadily got worse, it's got to the point now I'm on antibiotics and steroids everytime I get the cold, and can barely climb the stairs without getting wheezy and out of breath! Awch I'm 19 and I feel 90! LOL.
Sorry for the moan, just had to get it off my chest, as currently I feel like an elephant is sitting on it so this relieves a little pressure lol.
Have a good night all, I'm off to inhale my ventolin! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)
PSL (IMG:style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)

[stevensfo]

I know my other half gets asthma quite badly and every time we go to Gibraltar to visit his sister we stock up on blue and brown inhalers! £3 each, quite a differsnce

I assume one is the ventolin for attacks, and one is the budenoside anti-inflammatory steroid. We pay about 4 euros for the ventolin here in Italy but last month we visited a specialist who said my son should start taking the budenoside again which he hadn't for many years.

65 euros !!

He hasn't taken this since we were in France over ten years ago but I'm sure we never paid so much.

*#^@! pharm companies! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/happy.gif) We get most of it back, but it seems exorbitant.

He also had an allergy test - dots all up and down both arms to identify likely culprits. The worse were house dust (as always) dogs and certain pollen that appears between Jan and April!

Steve

[Yuuzuki]

Totally been struggling lately too.
Was having bad attacks for a couple of weeks before coming down with flu & pneumonia (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sad.gif)

The flu/pneumonia side has gotten better recently, but I wish my asthma would go back to being under control...the doctor I see here in Japan just keeps giving me the same (very expensive) medicine.

If anyone can find it, I'd like my old singing voice back too ^^;

[liseypeasy]

Totally been struggling lately too.
Was having bad attacks for a couple of weeks before coming down with flu & pneumonia (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sad.gif)

The flu/pneumonia side has gotten better recently, but I wish my asthma would go back to being under control...the doctor I see here in Japan just keeps giving me the same (very expensive) medicine.

If anyone can find it, I'd like my old singing voice back too ^^;

How do they treat asthma in Japan? I've found that actually sticking to 2 puffs of Beclometasome morning and night has more or less sorted me out (is there a touch wood smiley). Running helps too.

Also do they have pneumonia vaccines in Japan? They're available for, I think (?) older people in UK and provide protection for a good few years and we also get flu jabs every year for free which I am most grateful for.

Whiskey may help with the voice (or not (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) )...

[Yuuzuki]

How do they treat asthma in Japan? I've found that actually sticking to 2 puffs of Beclometasome morning and night has more or less sorted me out (is there a touch wood smiley). Running helps too.

Also do they have pneumonia vaccines in Japan? They're available for, I think (?) older people in UK and provide protection for a good few years and we also get flu jabs every year for free which I am most grateful for.

Whiskey may help with the voice (or not (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) )...

Beclometasone is a bit weak for me - back in the UK I was on Seretide 250 (Purple, combination preventer), Singulair and Ventolin.

They seem to give everyone Symbicort, Singulair and Meptin Air (like Ventolin but more compact & stronger) here in Japan, but they added Theophylline to my prescription cos I need the extra prevention.

Oddly enough I had the one off pneumonia jab back at home a few years ago and my yearly flu jab a week before I moved away, but the doctor suggested it was a different strain that's more common here.

I'm thinking my lungs may start to behave when I move off this mountain in Fukushima and near Tokyo in May....where the air is less thin XD

[liseypeasy]

Beclometasone is a bit weak for me - back in the UK I was on Seretide 250 (Purple, combination preventer), Singulair and Ventolin.

They seem to give everyone Symbicort, Singulair and Meptin Air (like Ventolin but more compact & stronger) here in Japan, but they added Theophylline to my prescription cos I need the extra prevention.

Oddly enough I had the one off pneumonia jab back at home a few years ago and my yearly flu jab a week before I moved away, but the doctor suggested it was a different strain that's more common here.

I'm thinking my lungs may start to behave when I move off this mountain in Fukushima and near Tokyo in May....where the air is less thin XD

That's interesting about the altitude. Also makes sense about the flu strain - what a pain though. Hope you don't pick up anything else in the meantime and your lungs will eventually recover. I feel grateful that I need relatively little to keep it under control.

[Swell Box]

So... hang on... is asthma an allergic reaction which makes you go wheezy? I heard from somewhere that it's the immune system attacking itself. So if animals fur, dust, plants etc make you wheezy, does that make you asthmatic?

Nobody really explains to me these things (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blush.gif)
When I was little I used to get the two words eczema and asthma muddled up- I knew I had one, but could never remember which (haha, it was eczema, which I had/have pretty badly)

I am sorry to hear about your Asthma FluteDiva, and I hope it gets better soon. Would a good quality face mask (of the type used by paint sprayers) provide any relief by filtering out irritants? I found that a face mask certainly helped my Hay Fever, which caused me severe wheezing on occasions.

I don't know whether Asthma is cyclical, but Hay Fever often is. I used to suffer terribly with Hay Fever in my teens. It came from nowhere when I was about 13, and persisted until I moved from Surrey to the northeast about twenty years later. I rarely suffer at all nowadays, even if I go back to the southeast in the summer.

I am not a Medic, but as I understand it, Asthma is a form of allergic reaction, in which the body learns to 'over-react' to specific irritants such as dust mite, pollens, fine animal hairs, industrial chemicals and so forth. Once the body has become 'sensitised' to one of these allergens it then suffers a severe reaction to even mild exposure.

The key here is that the allergens need to be of 'respirable size'; in other words, the particles must be small enough that they can get past the nasal passages into the lower respiratory tract where they have an irritant effect, but do not necessarily cause permanent damage in the way that (say) silica dusts do.

In many ways Asthma is similar to Dermatitis, where the skin can suddenly, and without warning become sensitive to a material which has never previously caused any adverse reaction. Latex and epoxy resins are known skin sensitizers, but many people suffer allergic reactions to more commonplace materials such as paper, (including loo paper)! Once the skin has become sensitised the individual concerned is rarely able to work with that material again.

I have known people who have worked with epoxies for 30 years or more, and have never suffered an adverse reaction until their skin suddenly became inflamed and itchy. Others have suffered adverse reactions on first exposure, but this is unusual. In most cases the adverse reaction can be attributed to an exposure overload of some kind; usually caused by changed working practices or hours, overly hot and sweaty conditions, or a change of materials.

I believe that Asthma is also related to Eczema, although I don't think the link is well understood. However, Asthmatics do seem to be more prone to developing allergic reactions than others, and so probably need to avoid environments which are likely to trigger sensitisation. There was also an interesting report in The Lancet a few years ago concerning a possible link between Asthma and the use of Paracetamol.

SB

[ansatz496]

I am not a Medic, but as I understand it, Asthma is a form of allergic reaction, in which the body learns to 'over-react' to specific irritants such as dust mite, pollens, fine animal hairs, industrial chemicals and so forth. Once the body has become 'sensitised' to one of these allergens it then suffers a severe reaction to even mild exposure.

The key here is that the allergens need to be of 'respirable size'; in other words, the particles must be small enough that they can get past the nasal passages into the lower respiratory tract where they have an irritant effect, but do not necessarily cause permanent damage in the way that (say) silica dusts do.

There don't have to be actual particles involved, do there? I have mild enough asthma that I can get away without taking any medication at all if I don't mind coughing and wheezing whenever I go outside at certain times of the year (I'm not sure whether it even qualifies as asthma, to be honest), but besides the obvious dust and exercise triggers whatever it is seems to be triggered primarily by temperature/weather conditions, especially cold or humid weather when there is a significant difference between air conditions inside and outside.

[Swell Box]

I am not a Medic, but as I understand it, Asthma is a form of allergic reaction, in which the body learns to 'over-react' to specific irritants such as dust mite, pollens, fine animal hairs, industrial chemicals and so forth. Once the body has become 'sensitised' to one of these allergens it then suffers a severe reaction to even mild exposure.

The key here is that the allergens need to be of 'respirable size'; in other words, the particles must be small enough that they can get past the nasal passages into the lower respiratory tract where they have an irritant effect, but do not necessarily cause permanent damage in the way that (say) silica dusts do.

There don't have to be actual particles involved, do there? I have mild enough asthma that I can get away without taking any medication at all if I don't mind coughing and wheezing whenever I go outside at certain times of the year (I'm not sure whether it even qualifies as asthma, to be honest), but besides the obvious dust and exercise triggers whatever it is seems to be triggered primarily by temperature/weather conditions, especially cold or humid weather when there is a significant difference between air conditions inside and outside.

Changes in air temperature and dry conditions seem to be a common factor which even 'non asthmatics' (and/or those who have yet to be diagnosed) seem to suffer from. However, without the irritant particles which sensitise the bronchial passages to begin with, changes in air temperature or humidity would probably have much less effect.

You mention 'certain times of the year'. In addition to pollens which we all know about, significant quantities of fungal spores become airborne at certain times of the year (especially during autumn), and are known allergens.

Research has also shown that thunderstorms can trigger particularly severe asthma attacks, as lightning strikes and the ultra high voltages involved in thunderstorms split airborne pollens into much smaller particles, which are able to find their way much deeper into the respiratory tract.

SB