Hazen Christensen

Asthma is a killer…. we seldom think of it or worry about the breaths we take until we are gasping for them.  I personally have moderate to severe asthma and it can sneak up on you throughout a day or month or year.  Asthma is no laughing matter and it’s definitely not one of those things you should let go.

It’s something I have lived with my entire life and something I usually don’t tell anyone.  WHY??

1- I don’t like to show weakness
2 – I don’t want sympathy
3- I was always told to never discuss your health unless it was good
4- People really don’t care
5- I don’t want to be a burden to anyone
6- It’s no one’s business anyway
7- It can be embarrassing at times

I am hoping this post will help others get treated before they are gasping for air and can’t breathe.  I had an ER visit myself today… and I just don’t like the way asthma is portrayed and perceived in the medical field or the general public.  It’s nothing to be ashamed of and it’s not worth dying over.  Get the help you need as soon as possible.  I have posted segments from other articles and stats from the AAFA.  Take a look and maybe this will help you or someone else you know.  – HC -   ASTHMA STATS from the aafa

ARTICLE from the NY TIMES:

In the end, it took Mike Ivey, 20, only a few minutes to die. Though he’d had asthma since the age of 11, Ivey was an energetic, active young man. He attended Catholic University in Washington on an academic scholarship and played varsity football while also holding down a full-time job and helping raise his 2-year-old daughter.

But when he was rushed to the emergency room last fall, gasping for air like a man drowning, Ivey was already doomed. Two weeks earlier, he had begun using his inhaler more frequently to open up his bronchial airways and breathe more easily. Apparently he didn’t realize that his increasing need for the inhaler meant something deadly was happening to his lungs.

His cousin brought Ivey into Providence Hospital in Washington at 8:24 P.M. on Friday, Sept. 18. At 8:40, Ivey went into respiratory arrest; 10 minutes later, his heart stopped beating. By 9:50, after all attempts to revive him had failed, the young scholar, athlete, husband and father was declared dead of asthma.

“Seeing those lungs at autopsy, I don’t know how he was even breathing,” says Dr. Margaret Barron, chairman of emergency medicine at Providence. “Kids like him, who are young and in good physical shape — strong heart, no coronary artery disease — don’t need that much oxygen to keep going. So they manage to just get by — until the bottom falls out.”

THIS IS A SCENE THAT SHOULD HAVE disappeared with an earlier generation. Yet young people are still suffocating because of an entirely treatable disease. Throughout the 1980′s, while deaths from childhood illnesses were declining for just about every other disease (besides AIDS), deaths from childhood asthma were on the rise.
(from the article in the New York Times: Asthma Kills by Robin Marantz Henig)

Doctors, the public and patients alike do NOT take this disease seriously enough.  Most of the time it’s treated in the general public as well as the medical industry as a hayfever type situation.  Its more serious than that and it’s a very common disease. – HC

FROM THE CORONERS OFFICE:

Nearly 5000 people die each year in this country from asthma; in another group equally as big, asthma is a contributor to their death. Although most people who die from asthma are over 50 years old, over the last 20 years there has been an 80% increase in the death rate among children and teens with asthma.

Asthma is a common disease. It is one of the leading causes of school absenteeism (and work absenteeism in adults). It is also a frequent cause of ER visits. The disease can be exacerbated by certain activities (e.g. sports participation), certain conditions (e.g. cold air), but it can strike anytime and can strike without apparent trigger.

Asthma is characterized by bronchiolar constriction/spasm and mucous thickening and plugging (with blocking of bronchioles). The latter condition is the most lethal and the most difficult to treat.

How do we prevent these deaths? This is a bit tougher than some of the other causes, but individuals need to have access to medical care and be assured (ensured) that they are receiving optimal care based on the most up-to-date treatment guidelines. People need to also be aware just how deadly this disease can be. We won’t prevent them all, but some deaths will then be prevented. All people must have access to quality medical care, or we must accept the consequences (people will die). (Full article form the Coroners Office)