Asthma patients look like completely healthy people until they have an attack. Asthma is a disease with intermittent asthma attacks occurring due to narrowing of the bronchi.
Causes of narrowing of the bronchi:
- spasm of the muscles of the bronchi;
- swelling of the mucosa;
- increased production of mucus.
Asthmatics have very sensitive airways. An attack can occur due to any irritating factor: smoke, dust, allergen, infectious factor, sprayed chemicals.
Often attacks occur at night, are of varying severity. Rapid development happens, can develop gradually – in a few hours. In some cases, an attack can go away on its own without the use of special measures and means. Hospitalization is sometimes required due to life threatening.
Even in mild cases, you cannot approach the attack lightly, you must always remember a clear plan of action. It is useful for asthmatics or people who have relatives with this disease in the family to write down actions on the card and always keep them close.
Symptoms
- cough;
- wheezing in the bronchi;
- a feeling of heaviness in the airways;
- a feeling of lack of oxygen;
- trembling, sweating;
- suffocation;
- a feeling of fear, sometimes confusion;
- active participation of the abdominal muscles in breathing.
Attack Actions
- Do not panic (panic aggravates the course of the attack). Keep calm, calm.
- Give the patient a sitting position – while breathing is greatly facilitated.
- Give the patient a medicine. Doctors recommend increasing the dose of aerosol due to the complexity of the flow of the drug to the area of action (bronchial spasms). The nebulizer will allow you to enter a large dose to the patient. Beta-adrenergic agonist in the form of an aerosol (salbutamol, alupent, terbutaline, fenoterol, etc.) can be used every 3-4 hours during an attack. Additionally, for severe attacks, corticosteroids (hormones that relieve inflammation) are prescribed, but only in the form of tablets, prednisone, for example.
- If 15 minutes after applying the first dose of the aerosol, the patient’s condition has not improved, an additional dose can be inhaled. After 10 minutes there is no improvement – call an ambulance.
- The patient should not get to the hospital on his own during an attack. The ambulance dispatcher needs to be informed that the patient has a severe asthma attack.
When an ambulance call is required
- In the absence of the action of a bronchodilating aerosol or its duration of less than 2 hours.
- The feeling of lack of air is very strong.
- Severe attacks with hospitalization previously occurred.
- High rate of attack.
- The patient has blueness of the skin, lips, nose (cyanosis).
- Some symptoms during the attack did not happen before, they are very worrying.
In an ambulance
Most likely, ambulance workers will use aminophylline. In especially severe cases, intravenous administration of hormonal drugs is used. The hospital uses oxygen inhalation, analyzes the blood for oxygen and carbon dioxide in order to assess the severity of the attack and determine further tactics.
Conclusion
Strict adherence to the sequence of actions for an asthma attack, taking into account the individual recommendations of the attending physician, will help to effectively cope with the attack. It should be noted that wheezing in the bronchi with severe seizures may be absent. At the slightest doubt, without any hesitation, you need to call an ambulance. Delay in severe cases can lead to death.
