What is Asthma? 

• Asthma is a chronic* disease of the airways in the lungs.
• In asthma, the airways are sensitive and always a little swollen.
• When asthma gets worse, the inside of the airways become more swollen and make extra mucous and the muscles on the outside of the airways tighten.
• The symptoms of asthma are cough, wheeze (whistling noise in the chest), feeling short of breath and chest tightness.

How do you get Asthma?

• You can not catch asthma from another person.
• A child may get asthma if:
  • a parent, brother or sister have asthma or allergies
  • the child has eczema or other allergies
• Some early childhood chest infections may help to "turn on" asthma.
• Exposure to tobacco smoke early in life causes more asthma and allergies.

 

Is it Asthma? 

To diagnose asthma, your doctor will ask questions about:

• when the problem first began
• how often breathing problems occur
• how long problems last
• how your child looks when he/she is having trouble breathing
• what seems to cause the symptoms (eg. just colds)
• if you notice symptoms at night 
• if there are symptoms with activity
• whether the child had to go to the hospital for symptoms
• medicines that have been used to treat symptoms and if they worked

What tests will be done? 

Your doctor will:

• examine the child's nose, chest and skin
• listen to the lungs and chest using a stethoscope
• ask older children to breathe out hard and long so any wheeze can be heard

Your doctor may also:

• do a breathing test (spirometry) in older children to help confirm whether the child has asthma
• try some asthma medicine to see if it helps the symptoms, which can help make the diagnosis
• do other special breathing tests (eg. exercise challenge test)
• refer you to an asthma specialist for more tests (eg. allergy testing)
• do a chest x-ray to rule out other causes for symptoms (eg. pneumonia)