by Anne StClair

Created on: March 09, 2008

I have exercise-induced asthma or EIA, which is one of the commonest forms of asthma. I had juvenile asthma, which I grew out of, but now as an adult I have asthma again. Fortunately, like most people with EIA I can exercise quite safely if I take the correct precautions. Many professional athletes have asthma.

Asthma is an inflammation of the bronchi, which are the tubes carrying air from the windpipe (trachea) into the lungs. It is a chronic, or long-term condition, but attacks are acute, or short-term. In extreme cases asthma attacks can be life-threatening.

The inflammation in the bronchi is always present to some degree, but often with no symptoms. In my case, I may get slight shortage of breath and a tight feeling around the chest on cold, dry days.

In an attack triggered by exercise, the bronchi swell and become blocked very quickly with mucus, making it hard to breathe out. You may also get a tight feeling around the chest, and may cough and wheeze. The symptoms can be extremely distressing.

It is thought that exercise induces an asthma attack because exercise changes the way you breathe. When resting, you breathe through your nose, and the air is warmed and humidified before it reaches the lungs. During aerobic exercise, you breathe through your mouth, and the air has no chance to be warmed and humidified before reaching the lungs. Cold, dry air hitting the warm, humid air in the lungs is thought to be what triggers the attack.

To avoid an attack I always take two puffs of Asmol or Ventolin about five minutes before I exercise. (There are other relievers, but I haven't tried them: Airomir, Bricanyl, and Epaq.) I make sure I warm up properly, and cool down properly afterwards, and I always keep the puffer with me. If I start to have any symptoms, I stop and take four puffs of reliever with deep breaths of air in between. I've never had to do this, but if those puffs did not work, I would take four more after four minutes and call an ambulance straight away. I would keep on taking four puffs every four minutes until the ambulance arrived.

Things have progressed enormously since I was a child, because there were no puffers at that time, and the pills took about twenty minutes to begin working. That is a long time to be in severe respiratory distress, and I was taken to hospital numerous times. With the puffers available now, it's much less distressing than it used to be.

At the moment my asthma is controlled by Asmol of Ventolin, and I have no problems exercising. The only thing that I cannot do is scuba diving, which is too risky for asthmatics. I was able to try this sport in the years before my asthma returned, but even then I used much more air than anyone else. There is a snorkel, however, which allows you to use asthma relievers when snorkelling. I see there is also now a regulator that does the same thing! Perhaps I can scuba dive again!

References:
http://www.emedicinehealth.com/exer cise-induced_asthma/article_em.htm
http://www.mydr.co m.au/default.asp?article=2613
http://medidive.delvtec h.com/asthma-freedom-snorkel.htm

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