“There are as many forms of asthma as there are patients”, assures Pr Raherison Semjen, pulmonologist at Bordeaux University Hospital. The signs of the disease vary in their diversity, intensity and frequency. Everyone must therefore learn to recognize their own symptoms and warning signs.
Always impressive for the entourage and distressing for the patient, asthma attack may last from a few minutes to several days, calm down on its own, or require treatment. A dry cough, especially at night, wheezing and / or difficulty breathing are the most characteristic signs of the attack.
Signs in people with allergies
Often asthma attack was preceded by signs that appeared gradually: severe fatigue, itchy throat, cough, shortness of breath, runny nose, repeated sneezing …
At the house of people with allergies however, the crisis can be triggered suddenly by simple contact with an allergen that causes asthma (animal hair, mites, peanuts, etc.). Without sufficient treatment (inhaled bronchodilator) symptoms may get worse, the person cannot speak, their lips or fingers turn blue. “A bit like a fish that we take out of the water” compares this nurse educator from the Asthma School of the Angoulême hospital center. We must then call the emergency services (15), because even today in France every day, nearly 3 people die an asthma attack.
Take a respiratory check-up
If he suspects asthma, the general practitioner refers his patient to a pulmonologist, for functional respiratory tests which will confirm the diagnosis. First essential examination: the measurement of breath by spirometry. “This involves breathing only through the mouth through the end of a hose connected to the spirometer, a first time and then a second a few minutes after inhaling a fast-acting bronchodilator”, explains Dr Cécilia Nocent-Ejnaini, pulmonologist at the Center hospitalier de la Côte Basque in Bayonne.
Painless, this test measures the Second Maximum Expiratory Volume (FEV1), i.e. the maximum volume of air that can be exhaled through the lungs during the first second of forced exhalation. In case of doubt, the spirometry will be supplemented by a “bronchial provocation test”: the person is made to inhale a substance which, in an asthmatic, causes a gradual decrease in the breath. If so, there is no doubt the person has asthma.
An allergological assessment must also be carried out.
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