CDC Advice Provides Ways to Help Control Asthma in Children and Adults

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are urging individuals to get informed as a crucial step in controlling their asthma and improving their quality of life.

According to the CDC, some of the benefits of controlling asthma include “fewer symptoms such as wheezing or coughing, better sleep, less missed work or school, participation in more physical activities, and fewer trips to the hospital.”

Education about the disease is a key component of keeping it under control to live a normal life. Asthma is caused by inflammation of the airways which leads to episodes of periodic obstruction of airflow.

The CDC recommends a first step to control asthma is by obtaining an accurate diagnosis followed by an effective use of medications. This information, combined with a good understanding of the causes and consequences of the disease, will allow the individual to modify their lifestyle so as to reduce environmental exposures and behaviors that may bring about episodes of asthma attacks.

Additional information on improving overall quality of life and productivity in children with asthma using home-based multi-trigger, multi-component interventions with an environmental focus are available from: Guide to Community Prevention Services website.

The guide is filled with information on potentially effective interventions for asthma control, including methodology for identification of the interventions, results, lessons learned, information on the interventions themselves, a bibliography of reviewed literature, and case studies of several interventions.