Advances in asthma management Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Advances in asthma management - Research Paper Example Most of the patients develop symptoms in early childhood. 80-90 percent of them experience symptoms before 6 years of age (Morris, 2014). But, the clinical presentation can occur at any age. If left unattended and in the presence of severe symptoms, asthma can contribute to morbidity and mortality. Asthma is an incurable disease and individuals with this condition will need regular follow-up and monitoring of symptoms. In this essay, advances in asthma will be discussed with reference to a case scenario. The most common symptoms of asthma in an adult are are wheezing, cough, nocturnal or exercise-induced cough, breathlessness, tightness of chest and sputum production (Morris, 2014). The symptoms may be perennial or seasonal, continuous or intermittent, or during the day or night. Some of the precipitating or aggravating factors include viral infections, intense emotions, environmental irritants, exercise, pets or carpets at home, drugs like aspirin, additive foods, weather changes, stress and certain diseases like gastrointestinal reflux, sinusitis and rhinitis (Morris, 2014; Hamilos, 1995). Many patients have a family history of asthma or other allergy conditions. Based on the history of frequency and the severity of acute exacerbation, asthma is classified into four types. They are mild intermittent asthma, mild persistent asthma, moderate persistent asthma and severe persistent asthma. It is important to ascertain the severity of asthma in a patient because; treatment of asthma is based on the severity and frequency of symptoms. In mild intermittent asthma, the symptoms occur less than twice a week. The flare-ups are brief and the intensity vary. Night symptoms occur less than 2 times a month and no symptoms occur in between flare-ups. FEV1 is atleast 80% of normal values. The variability of peak flow is less than 20 % (SIGN, 2009). In mild persistent asthma, the