About 8% of adults have asthma. If you need asthma diagnosis or management, you can’t beat the pulmonary care experts at TruDoc Medical LLC in Clifton, New Jersey. Triple board-certified Bassel Noumi, MD, and the team offer the finest in patient-centered asthma care, so reach out by phone or through the online appointment maker now.
Asthma is a pulmonary disease in which inflamed air passages swell and disrupt normal breathing. People with asthma experience episodes of breathing difficulties called asthma attacks.
In an asthma attack, your airways grow oversensitive, responding to certain triggers with irritation, inflammation, and swelling. That narrows the airways and makes breathing difficult.
An asthma attack usually causes symptoms such as:
Asthma can affect every person differently. Both frequency and intensity of asthma attacks can vary quite a bit. Some people have breathing difficulties and other asthma-related issues every day, but others have only rare asthma attacks, often after exposure to a particular trigger.
There are many asthma triggers, and they're individual to each person. You usually recognize your triggers more and more over time, and testing may narrow them down so you know what to avoid.
Some common triggers in asthmatics include:
Exercise may also trigger an asthma attack.
TruDoc Medical LLC offers comprehensive diagnostic testing onsite. Spirometry, which measures the air you inhale and exhale, is a very important test for asthma diagnosis.
If the team suspects asthma causes your symptoms, they commonly perform a spirometry test and then administer asthma medication before doing another test. If your lung function improves between the two tests, asthma is the most likely cause of your respiratory difficulties.
You may also need other tests to rule out other problems, find co-occurring issues, or confirm an asthma diagnosis. These can include:
Up to 75% of adults with asthma also have allergies, and up to 60% have obstructive sleep apnea. By having the specific tests the team recommends, you can learn the true underlying causes of all your breathing issues.
Asthma isn't curable, but it's manageable with help from the TruDoc Medical LLC team. In most cases, you need two types of medication:
Long-term medication, which includes inhaled and oral drugs like corticosteroids, can prevent asthma attacks and reduce symptoms when you take them every day.
A rescue inhaler, which you use only during an asthma attack, contains albuterol, a fast-onset medication that can open your lung passages and allow you to breathe.
Along with medication, trigger management is very important. Avoiding triggers can greatly reduce the frequency and intensity of your asthma attacks. If you have co-occurring conditions like sleep apnea or allergies, the team can prescribe condition-specific solutions for those as well.
Book your asthma appointment by calling TruDoc Medical LLC or clicking the scheduling link now.
