What is Asthma?
Asthma is a long-term lung disease that inflames and narrows the airways. Asthma causes returning periods of wheezing, chest tightness, shortness of breath, and coughing. The coughing often occurs at night or early in the morning. Asthma affects people of all ages, but it most often starts during childhood. In the United States, more than 25 million people are known to have asthma. About 7 million of these people are children.
The airways are tubes that carry air into and out of your lungs. People who have asthma have inflamed airways. This makes them swollen and very sensitive. When the airways react, the muscles around them tighten. This narrows the airways, causing less air to flow into the lungs. The swelling also can worsen, making the airways even narrower. This chain reaction can result in asthma symptoms.
An asthma attack is a sudden worsening of asthma symptoms caused by the tightening of muscles around your airways . During the asthma attack, the lining of the airways also becomes swollen or inflamed. Inflammation, and mucus production causes symptoms of an asthma attack such as difficulty breathing, wheezing, coughing, shortness of breath, and difficulty performing normal daily activities.
Asthma has no cure. Even when you feel fine, you still have the disease and it can flare up at any time. However, with today's knowledge and treatments, most people who have asthma are able to manage the disease. They have few, if any, symptoms. They can live normal, active lives and sleep through the night without interruption from asthma.
