Many people with asthma aren’t able to detect a problem with their breathing until the asthma attack becomes severe. But a new training method developed by researchers at Ohio University could one day help asthma patients detect an attack as ear ly as 30 minutes before its onset.
The method helps asthma patients improve their perception of air flow resistance caused by constricted air passages, said Harry Kotses, professor of psychology and co-author of the research. In a study of 45 asthma patients who took part in the training, researchers found that participants had fewer asthma attacks because they detected the problems earlier and took medication before the onset of an attack.
“Breathing is so natural to us, we do it without thin king, and that’s true for asthma patients as well,” Kotses said. “If people with asthma can learn to be sensitive to changes in resistance to air flow, they might be able to detect the early stages of an asthma attack and stop it before serious breathing difficulty occurs.”
Asthma, the most common chronic childhood illness, affects nearly 15 million Americans, 5 million of whom are under the age of 19. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, asthma accounted for an estimated 198, 000 hospitalizations and 342 deaths in 1993. The illness usually is controlled by steroids that reduce inflammation of tissues in the airway, by bronchial dilators that relax constricted muscles, or both.
During the study, asthma patients were asked to breathe through nylon mesh screens. Each screen had a different weave — some allowed for greater resistance to air flow and some for less resistance. Participants judged the level of difficulty they experienced while breathing through each of the scre ens.
By the end of the study, most participants were able to identify correctly those screens that presented the most problems.
“A primary benefit of perception training may be that it increases the length of the warning period a patient has prior to the onset of an attack,” Kotses said.
