Your doctor has prescribe medication to help manage your asthma. It is important that it is taken inhaler properly and regularly.
Make a habit of taking your inhaler every morning and evening at the same time. Set a reminder on your phone. Keep it in a convenient place where you will see it often, like on your bedside table.
1. Learn Your Triggers
People who have asthma often react to certain things in their environment, call triggers. Triggers can make asthma symptoms worse and can lead to an asthma attack. It’s important to learn what triggers your asthma and to work with a health care provider to find ways to reduce exposure to the triggers that make your asthma worse. Asthma triggers can be allergens (like pollen, mold and pet dander), irritants (like chemical fumes and cigarette smoke) or other things like exercise and emotions.
Your own asthma triggers may be different from someone else’s, and can change over time. Keep a record of your triggers by using an asthma diary or Asthma Action Plan. You can also share your asthma diary with a doctor to find patterns in your triggers. You can identify allergy-relate triggers by getting a skin or blood test to determine what you are allergic to.
Some people have one or two asthma triggers, while others may have a dozen. It’s important to know your triggers and to avoid them, because asthma symptoms can be prevent with the proper medication and control techniques.
When your airways are irritated, they can’t breathe as well and that is when an asthma attack or flare-up occurs. Symptoms of an asthma flare-up include wheezing, coughing and shortness of breath. This includes prescription and over-the-counter drugs, vitamins, minerals and herbal supplements. A health care provider can tell you if these are possible triggers and can recommend alternative medicines. Asthma patients who are sensitive to these medications should consult with their health care providers before taking them. This way they can find other medicines that are safe to take.
2. Take Your Medication at the Right Time
The effectiveness of these medications is greatly increase when they are take at the correct time. Patients should be instruct on the right times to take their medication and be provide with a schedule. This should include what to do if they forget a dose and how long they can wait before taking the next one. This schedule will help patients understand how to manage their white inhaler asthma.
Patients should also be taught how to use their inhaler correctly. There are different ways to do this depending on the type of inhaler. A doctor or nurse will be able to show patients how to use their device and demonstrate the correct steps.
Some inhalers have a mouthpiece on one end to help with administration; this is call a spacer. It helps to increase the amount of medicine that reaches the small airways in the lungs. Spacers are especially helpful for children and those who have difficulty inhaling the medication on their own.
Steroid inhalers are sprays or powders that are use to prevent asthma symptoms and attacks from occurring. There are many types of steroid inhalers, and they are all use slightly differently. A health professional will be able to show you how to use your inhaler and check your technique. The website Asthma + Lung UK has videos that explain how to use different types of inhalers.
Many inhalers have a counter on them to track how much medication is left. It is important to check the counter regularly to make sure that you are using your medication appropriately. If you notice that the counter is going down, ask your healthcare professional for a refill.
3. Practice Your Inhaler Technique
When people are first prescribe inhalers, it is important to show how to use them correctly by a health professional. Even after written instructions are provided, a study found that only 93% of patients could demonstrate correct inhaler technique. Self-report adherence and asthma control scores were also significantly worse in those who could not perform the correct inhaler technique.
Using the wrong inhaler or not doing so correctly can result in not getting the full benefit of the medicine and can lead to more serious side effects, such as pneumonia.
Inhaler technique is very complex, and it takes time to master, but it can be taught. The best way to improve inhaler technique is to practice and ask for help until you get it right. Often, people need to be taught how to use the right spacer as well, which is a large plastic or metal container with a mouthpiece at one end and a hole for the inhaler at the other. This is meant to make inhalers easy to use, and it can also reduce the amount of medicine swallow or absorbe into the body.
It is also important to do regular practice tests on yourself to see how long it takes you to actuate the Green Asthma Inhaler. Using a stopwatch or clock with a second hand, start inhaling slowly, then pretend to actuate your inhaler and see how long it takes you to fill your lungs completely. If it is less than three seconds, then you need to do more practice.
Asthma management is important to avoid complications, but it can be difficult for people with chronic diseases to remember all the different things they have to do to keep themselves healthy. It is therefore vital to review your Asthma Action Plan on a regular basis and to talk to your doctor or nurse if you have any questions or concerns about how to manage your condition.
4. Review Your Asthma Action Plan
A written asthma action plan can be an effective tool for improving patient knowledge and self-management. Studies have shown that when written plans are provide to patients at least once a year, they can result in improvements in symptom control, quality of life and adherence to medication.1
Asthma action plans should be tailor to the individual patient’s symptoms, language, literacy and ability to self-manage. There are templates available that are widely use in GP practice that can be modify to meet the needs of the patient.2
The asthma action plan should also include information about the patient’s peak flow meters and nebulisers, as these can be useful tools for monitoring asthma symptoms. The asthma action plan can be use to educate the patient and their family members about how to monitor symptoms at home. It can also be use to highlight what the best course of action is when symptoms get worse. This includes explaining the importance of contacting their GP as soon as possible, as well as appropriate alternatives such as local walk-in centres.
Finally, it is important to make sure that the asthma action plan is carry with the patient at all times. This includes taking it to any hospital appointments, as this can be useful in helping doctors at the hospital better understand the patient’s condition.
This can also be helpful when a patient is changing GPs, as it will give the new GP a good understanding of the patient’s condition and current medication. Finally, it is important to make sure that all people involve in the care of a person with asthma, such as school and daycare providers, have copies of the asthma action plan.
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