Peak Flow Meter
A peak flow meter is a device that helps you determine how well your asthma is being controlled and how well your lungs are working at a given time. This is a simple but important tool in daily asthma management. Peak flow meters are available over the counter.
The readings from the meter will help you and your health care provider:
• Determine the severity of your asthma.
• Evaluate the effectiveness of your current treatment.
• Determine when to add or stop certain medicines.
• Recognize an asthma attack before signs or symptoms appear.
• Decide when to seek emergency care.
RISKS AND COMPLICATIONS
• Dizziness. Breathing too quickly into the peak flow meter may cause dizziness. This could cause you to pass out. Take your time
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Your asthma is getting worse and could be improved.
• You may have begun coughing, wheezing, or feeling chest tightness. Sometimes peak flow rates dip down into the yellow zone before asthma symptoms appear.
• Consider increasing or changing your asthma medicine. This may include using your rescue medicine. If you have an asthma action plan, follow each step listed for the yellow zone, including medicine changes.
Red Zone = Danger
• Peak flow rate below 50% of your personal best. This may mean you are having, or are at risk of having, a medical emergency.
• Your coughing, wheezing, or shortness of breath may have become severe. Do not wait to use your rescue medicine. Stop whatever you are doing and use your rescue inhaler, nebulizer, or other medicines to open your airways.
• If you have an asthma action plan, follow each step listed for the red zone, including medicine changes and when to seek emergency medical care.
If your flow readings fall too far below your personal best into the yellow or red zone, you will need to take action to prevent or minimize an asthma attack.
SEEK MEDICAL CARE
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For Ventolin to work optimally, situations that may trigger an asthma attack must be avoided. These situations include exercising in cold, dry air; smoking; breathing in dust; and exposure to allergens such as pet fur or pollens. Relating to the case study, a few of these may apply to the patient, such as exercising in the cold morning air and perhaps breathing in dust and allergens such as pollens or maybe from the eucalyptus in the Blue Mountains might have had an effect on his condition.
Peak flow meters allow someone to monitor if there are any changes in their lung function and breathing. People with asthma or other lung diseases use peak flow meters. They can take their PEF reading twice a day independently at home, although young children need supervision while taking their peak flow. Using a peak flow meter daily allows people to track the control of their lung disfunction and it shows if treatment is working correctly. Taking a peak flow reading also allows the user to recognise signs of their lungs flaring up before symptoms appear. The user will know when to call their doctor for emergency care.
During an asthma attack, the walls of the airways become irate, and the mucous membrane found on the walls of the lungs become swollen with fluid and mucus fills taking up the remaining space, making it difficult to breathe. *Because air cannot flow in and out of the lungs freely, a whistling or wheezing sound may be heard. During a severe attack, wheezing might stop because of the air moving in and out of the lungs are too weak to make a...
The assumed etiology of exercise induced asthma has two basic theories. One theory concerns the water content of the air that is being breathed in to the lungs (dry) and the other theory concern...
"Asthma is a pulmonary disease with the following characteristics: 1) airway obstruction that is reversible in most patients either spontaneously or with treatment; 2) airway inflammation; and 3) increased airway responsiveness to a variety of stimuli" (Enright, 1996, p. 375). There presently exist many varieties of asthma that differ in the severity, means of induction, and methods of treatment. One type is exercise-induced asthma. "Exercise-induced asthma (EIA) is a temporary increase in airway resistance and acute narrowing of the airway that occurs after several minutes of strenuous exercise, usually after the exercise had ceased" (Spector, 1993, p. 571). Perfectly healthy individuals with no history of asthma or allergies can experience EIA. EIA can be found in 5.6%-25% of the general population and in 40%-90% of asthmatics (Randolph, 1997). EIA has been recognized for over 300 years, but only recently have it's pathophysiology, diagnosis, and treatment been studied in detail.
First, a problem with your lungs or airways may disturb the patient’s breathing system. Sudden breathlessness could be an asthma attack. This shows that your airways have narrowed and you will produce more phlegm (sticky mucus), which will cause you to cough and wheeze. You will feel breathless because it will be hard to move air in and out of your airways. Patients are recommended to use a spacer device with your asthma inhaler. This will bring more medicine to your lungs, helping to relieve your breathlessness. (NHS, 2013)
... “The Best Step-Up Regimen for Uncontrolled Asthma in Children.” Medscape Today. 25 May 2010. Web. 01 June 2010. .
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Most of you may not think of asthma as a killer disease, yet more that 5,000 Americans die of asthma each year. According to the Mayo Clinic web page, asthma also accounts for more that 400,000 hospital discharges annually. As the number of people with asthma increases, the more likely you are to come in contact with a person who has the disease. As far as I can remember, I have had asthma my whole life. My mother and one of my sisters also have asthma, so I have a first hand experience with it. This morning, I will discuss some interesting facts about asthma, I will specifically focus on what it is, warning signs, symptoms, causes, and the treatments that are used.
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A titration curve is a plot of pH of the analyte solution versus volume of titrant added, as the titration progresses. 9,12 The equivalence point is the inflection point of a titration curve.9