Asthma

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Recommended: Asthma physiology and pathophysiology

Asthma is a disease that, according to Massoud Mahmoudi in Allergy and Asthma: Practical Diagnosis and Management, is “…a disorder of chronic airway inflammation associated with episodic and at least partially reversible airflow obstruction” (pg. 125). According to Mahmoudi, its causes are unknown and its pathogenesis is not completely understood. However, it can be most likely determined that asthma is more closely related to a syndrome than a disease with a single structural or genetic cause; this determination can be deduced from considering the various clinical manifestations and irregular inheritance patterns.
One of the main environmental stimuli that exacerbate asthma symptoms, along with asthma attack, is allergies by stimulating inflammation, which is the main cause for symptoms. According to Gerard J. Tortora and Bryan Derrickson in Principles of Anatomy and Physiology, inflammation is a nonspecific, defensive response of the body to tissue damage. Conditions that stimulate inflammation include: pathogens, abrasions, chemical irritations, cell distortion or disturbance, and extreme temperatures. In each case of inflammation, due to no specificity, the inflammatory has three stages: vasodilation and increased blood vessel permeability; movement of white blood cells from blood into interstitial fluid; tissue repair (2012). According to the National Institute of Health (NIH) in Understanding Asthma pathophysiology, one of the ways asthma is defined is through bronchial hyperresponsiveness; this is how inflammation affects the lungs. Bronchial hyperresponsiveness can be described by decreased airflow after bronchial irritation by methacholine or histamine. Bronchial provocation with allergens induces an early and late phase...

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...ia medicaid population. Retrieved from http://www.wvdhhr.org/bph/hsc/staterv/viewer.asp?target=http://www.wvdhhr.or/bph/hsc/pubs/briefs/012/default.htm&Source=pub.asp&DocID=53
International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Childhood. (2011). The global asthma report. Retrieved from http://www.globalasthmareport.org/images/files/Global_Asthma_Report_2011.pdf
Mahmoudi, M. (2008). Allergy and asthma: Practical diagnosis and management. (pp. 124-125). New Yok: McGraw-Hill Medical. DOI: web.a.ebscohost.com/ehost/ebookviewer/ebook/bmxlYmyfXzIxNDkyOF9fQU41?sid=da57c6be-dfae-41d0-a054-42aa7b546@sessionmgr4001&vid=2&format=EB&rid=1
National Institute of Health. (2003). Understanding asthma pathophysiology. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12776439
Tortora, G., & Derrickson, B. (2012). Principles of antomy&physiology. (13 ed., p. 888). John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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