This year's 2 May marks the 25th World Asthma Day, and the theme of this year's Asthma Day is "Caring for Every Asthma Sufferer".
According to the latest epidemiological survey, the number of asthma patients in mainland China is about 45 million. Due to the lack of understanding of asthma, many patients do not receive comprehensive and formal treatment, nor do they undergo long-term and regular follow-up. This makes the overall level of asthma control in mainland China poor, and many patients suffer from asthma attacks. On the occasion of World Asthma Day, let's get to know asthma, help asthma patients relieve their concerns, recognize the disease, adhere to treatment, and let every asthma patient achieve complete asthma control as soon as possible.
Q1
What is asthma?
Asthma, full name "bronchial asthma", it is a chronic inflammatory disease of the airways.
It is important to note that "inflammation" here is different from what we generally call "inflammation".
Inflammation in asthma is a non-infectious inflammation involving a variety of cells and cellular components. Inflammation, which is commonly referred to as "inflamed", in most cases refers to infection, especially bacterial infection.
The familiar term "anti-inflammatory" generally refers to antibiotics. It is commonly used to treat infectious inflammation. Asthma cannot be treated with conventional "anti-inflammatory drugs".
Q2
What are the symptoms of asthma?
Asthma can be divided into typical and atypical categories.
Typical asthma symptoms include recurrent wheezing, shortness of breath, and may be accompanied by chest tightness or cough. It occurs frequently at night or in the early morning, and often occurs in contact with allergens, cold air or physical and chemical stimuli. Sometimes it can occur after exercise. Upper respiratory tract infections can also cause asthma attacks.
"Recurrent" is an important feature of asthma symptoms, meaning that they recur but resolve spontaneously over a short period of time (tens of minutes, hours, or days) or with treatment.
Atypical asthma Sometimes asthma can have no "wheezing" or "wheezing" and only a cough (called cough variant asthma) and chest tightness (called chest tightness variant asthma).
In addition, some people are asymptomatic, and only pulmonary function tests show increased airway responsiveness. This group of people may progress to classic asthma in the future.
Q3
Why does asthma get around me?
Allergic asthma is the most common type of asthma, with about 60% of adult asthma and 80% of childhood asthma being allergic asthma. Allergic asthma can be triggered by exposure to allergens.
Allergens are generally divided into inhalation allergens (such as various pollen, mold, dust mites, animal fur, etc. that can be dispersed in the air), food allergens (such as milk, eggs, fish, shrimp, shellfish, nuts, etc.), contact allergens (such as hot and cold air, cleaning products such as dish soap, disinfectants, hair dyes, shampoos and other care products, metal jewelry, etc.) and other allergens.
Inhaled allergens are distinctly regional and seasonal. Taking Beijing as an example, spring airborne allergens in Beijing are mainly cypress pollen, elm pollen, willow pollen and a few weed pollen. In summer and autumn, allergens are mainly Chenopodaceae pollen, Humulus pollen and Artemisia pollen. Cypress pollen, large seed artemisia pollen, birch pollen, etc. have a high proportion of strong positive reactions and strong allergenicity, and it is recommended that susceptible people do a good job of protection. On the contrary, peach blossoms, pear blossoms, etc. are mostly insect-borne flowers, pollen particles are large, the amount is not much, it is not easy to spread around, and usually does not cause allergies.
Q4
What should I do if I have symptoms?
When symptoms similar to asthma appear, you should go to a regular hospital for examination as soon as possible. Pulmonary function tests are the most commonly used tests to diagnose and evaluate asthma.
Sometimes, your doctor will give you further tests such as exhaled nitric oxide (FeNO), eosinophil count, serum total IgE, and allergen-specific IgE to make a thorough evaluation, depending on the characteristics of your condition.
The goal of asthma treatment is overall control of asthma symptoms and to reduce the risk of future flare-ups. However, according to statistics, less than half of patients in urban areas of China achieve asthma control, and the control rate may be lower in remote areas and grassroots patients. The management of asthma requires both doctors and patients.
Authors: Guo Fangfang and Hu Yan, Department of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Peking University First Hospital
Review: Wang Guangfa, expert of the National Health Science Popularization Expert Database and director of the Department of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine of Peking University First Hospital
Curator: Tan Jia
Editor: Hu Bin