What is ASTHMA?
Asthma is an ongoing condition that interferes with your child’s breathing. Children with asthma almost always have some degree of inflammation in their lungs, even if there are no symptoms. As a result, their lungs are especially sensitive and easily irritated. When irritated by a trigger, their airways swell up and become filled with mucus. This blocks the flow of oxygen to their lungs and makes it hard for them to breathe. At the same time, the muscles around their airways constrict and grow tighter. When this happens, their breathing passages narrow; this also makes it hard to breathe and creates a variety of asthma symptoms. It is, therefore, important for them to take a preventive (also known as controller) medicine regularly to keep this inflammation down in the first place.
Asthma is a common, serious, chronic disease of childhood. It affects the lung airways, which are also known as bronchial tubes. “Chronic” means that asthma is not curable. It is highly treatable, however, and can be effectively managed throughout life. Approximately 20 million people have asthma, including 6.1 million children in the United States.1 Up to 80% of children with asthma develop symptoms before they are 5 years old.
Asthma (pronounced: az-muh) is a lung condition that causes a person to have difficulty breathing. Asthma is a common condition: More than 6 million kids and teens have it. Asthma affects a person’s bronchial (pronounced: brahn-kee-ul) tubes, also known as airways. When a person breathes normally, air is taken in through the nose or mouth and then goes into the trachea (windpipe), passing through the bronchial tubes, into the lungs, and finally back out again. But people with asthma have airways that are inflamed. This means that they swell and produce lots of thick mucus. They are also overly sensitive, or hyperreactive, to certain things, like exercise, dust, or cigarette smoke. This hyperreactivity causes the smooth muscle that surrounds the airways to tighten up. The combination of airway inflammation and muscle tightening narrows the airways and makes it difficult for air to move through. In most people with asthma, the difficulty breathing happens periodically.
Asthma is a serious chronic disease that affects your lungs. It causes repeated episodes of wheezing, breathlessness, chest tightness, and nighttime or early morning coughing. Asthma is with you all the time, but you may have “asthma attacks or episodes” only when something bothers your lungs. Asthma cannot not cured but can be controlled.
