They will only keep your asthma under control if you use them correctly. Make sure you know how to use your asthma medications properly. See your doctor about making treatment changes. If you frequently use a quick-relief inhaler to treat symptoms, your asthma isn't under control. Long-term control medications are the key to keeping your asthma controlled and in the green zone. Knowing when to use these medications can help prevent an impending asthma attack. They're used as needed to quickly open your airways and make breathing easier. These medications are sometimes called rescue inhalers. Quick-relief inhalers contain a fast-acting medication such as albuterol.Used on a daily basis, these medications can reduce or eliminate asthma flare-ups. These preventive medications treat the airway inflammation that leads to asthma symptoms. Long-term control medications such as inhaled corticosteroids are the most important medications used to keep asthma under control.There are two main types of medications used to treat asthma: Less than 60% of your predicted personal best More than 80% of your predicted personal bestĦ0 to 80% of your predicted personal best Quick-relief inhaler use to control symptoms Symptoms such as coughing, wheezing or shortness of breath Peak flow readings improve if narrowed airways open up with treatment.īelow is an example of a two-week diary of peak flow readings done by a child who has quite bad asthma.Levels of asthma control in children older than 12 and adults Measuring your peak flow readings can help assess how well treatment is working. You and your healthcare provider will determine what your personal best exhalation is and then base your action on a percentage of that number. If the treatment causes a large improvement in your reading, this too is typical of asthma. Many asthma action plans use peak flows as one of the criteria for intervention on your part. Sometimes a peak flow reading is done before and after you take a dose of asthma medicine to open up your airways. This information can be used to inform your asthma action plan and help doctors make decisions to alleviate asthma symptoms or prevent asthma attacks. You will normally be asked to take a 'best of three' peak flow reading each morning and evening. Sometimes a doctor or nurse will give you a chart (like the one below), and ask you to keep a record of your peak flow readings for a week or so. This difference is much greater in people with untreated asthma than the normal small variation seen in most people. Typically, the readings are lower in the morning compared with the evening. Your peak flow readings will tend to vary quite a lot.No matter how strong you are, if your airways are narrowed, your peak flow will be lower than expected for your age, size, and sex. Your peak flow readings will usually be low. What are peak flow meters used for? To help diagnose asthma Another common error is to not put your lips right round the mouthpiece to make sure that all the air you blow out goes through the device. A common error is to not to blow as hard as you can. If they are not, you may not be blowing into the device correctly. However, when you do three blows straight after each other, the readings should all be about the same. The 'best of three' is the reading to record. When checking your peak flow score, you should do three blows, one after the other. The further reading section has a link to an Asthma UK website which has a video showing how to use a peak flow meter. Briefly, you must put the marker to zero, take a deep breath, close your lips around the mouthpiece, then blow air out of your lungs as fast as you can into the device. It is important to do this correctly otherwise, the readings can be misleading. Your doctor,nurse or other healthcare professional will show you how to take a peak flow test.
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