Avoiding known allergens and respiratory irritants can significantly reduce asthma symptoms. If somebody with asthma is responsive to dust mites, contact can be reduced by encasing mattresses and pillows in allergen-impermeable covers, removing carpets from bedrooms, and by vacuuming regularly. Exposure to dust mites and mould can be reduced by lowering indoor humidity.

If a individual is allergic to an animal that cannot be removed from the home, the animal should be kept out of that person’s bedroom at least.

Filtering material can be placed over the heating outlets to trap animal dander. Exposure to cigarette smoke, air pollution, industrial dusts, and irritating fumes should also be avoided as much as possible.

Allergy desensitisation can be helpful in reducing asthma symptoms and medication use, but the size of the advantage compared to other treatments is not known.

Asthmatics can also prevent and control attacks by limiting their exposure to environmental triggers.

• Carpets, beddings etc should be regularly cleaned.
• A mask should be worn
• Bathe pets regularly
• Steer clear of pollutants and irritants
• Cyclic allergies to pollen and mold spores can be reduced by avoiding the outside during peak periods of activity

Asthma Complications:

• Respiratory fatigue
• Pneumothorax
• Side effects of any medication used
• Death

Asthma Prognosis (Prospect)

There is no cure for asthma, though symptoms sometimes decrease over a period of time. With appropriate self-management and therapeutic treatment, most people with asthma can lead normal lives.

Although asthma often improves in children as they reach their teens, it is now realized the illness frequently returns in the second, third and fourth decades of life.

Previously data indicating a natural reduction in asthma through adolescent years has led to childhood asthma being treated as an intermittent disorder. However, it is now considered that airway inflammation is present continuously from an early age and frequently persists even if the symptoms resolve.

Furthermore, airways remodelling accelerates the process of decline in lung function over a period of time. This has led to a review of the management strategy for asthma, encouraging the early use of efficient and effective controller drugs and environmental measures from the time asthma is first diagnosed.