Case Study: Asthma Assessment Case Study: Asthma Assessment A 6 year old male has coughing with audible expiratory wheezes and dyspnea. The child is pale, skin is moist and cool and he has difficulty speaking more than a few words before stopping to catch his breath. His parents state the difficult breathing had a rapid onset approximately 1 hour earlier when he was playing with the neighbors dog. The child has a history of previous asthma attacks, primarily after visiting his aunts home where there are cats. Assessment of the child shows T 98.6, P 120, R 40 and labored. Bilateral rales are heard on auscultation, louder on expiration but also present on inspiration. 1. Discuss what brought about this current episode (2 points) 2. Was there a history of previous attacks and what were they related to? (2 points) 3. What physiologic changes occur during an acute asthmatic episode (refer to your text) (8 points) 4. How would this particular boy subjectively describe dyspnea (2 points) 5. List the assessment findings and clearly indicate if they normal/abnormal and list a reason the value would be abnormal (10 points) 6. What test can be performed to reveal the degree of airway obstruction? (2 points) 7. What test could be considered to help gain information on possible triggers? (2 points) 8. Briefly describe how bronchodilators and corticosteroids help in the treatment of asthma (4 points) 9. When considering patient education make a list of items that you could tell or show the parents/boy (6 points) ORDER INSTRUCTIONS-COMPLIANT NURSING PAPERS Solution Preview 1). In the given case, the patient had the history of asthma after exposure to cats, and in the current situation, he developed acute asthmatic attack after ? You must proofread your paper. But do not strictly rely on your computers spell-checker and grammar-checker; failure to do so indicates a lack of effort on your part and you can expect your grade to suffer accordingly. Papers with numerous misspelled words and grammatical mistakes will be penalized. Read over your paper ? in silence and then aloud ? before handing it in and make corrections as necessary. Often it is advantageous to have a friend proofread your paper for obvious errors. Handwritten corrections are preferable to uncorrected mistakes. Use a standard 10 to 12 point (10 to 12 characters per inch) typeface. Smaller or compressed type and papers with small margins or single-spacing are hard to read. It is better to let your essay run over the recommended number of pages than to try to compress it into fewer pages. Likewise, large type, large margins, large indentations, triple-spacing, increased leading (space between lines), increased kerning (space between letters), and any other such attempts at ?padding? to increase the length of a paper are unacceptable, wasteful of trees, and will not fool your professor. The paper must be neatly formatted, double-spaced with a one-inch margin on the top, bottom, and sides of each page. When submitting hard copy, be sure to use white paper and print out using dark ink. If it is hard to read your essay, it will also be hard to follow your argument. Case Study: Asthma Assessment Order Now

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Asthma Assessment

Introduction

Asthma is a fairly common condition that affects the airways in your lungs. It can cause wheezing, chest tightness and coughing. In children, asthma might also cause shortness of breath or rapid breathing. Asthma can be treated with medicines and lifestyle changes including avoiding triggers such as dust, pollen and other allergens; exercising regularly; wearing a mask when you must exercise outdoors or work in areas with high levels of pollen; keeping your home clean to avoid mould spores and dust mites; not smoking cigarettes; getting enough rest; eating foods containing Omega-3 fatty acids like fish oil supplements to reduce inflammation in your body caused by asthma attacks (e.g., heart attacks).

What are the symptoms of asthma?

• Wheezing: This is the most common symptom of asthma and it can be experienced in different ways. If you have wheezing, your breathing may sound like a cat who is trying to get out of a glass bottle or a dog trying to breathe through a straw. Sometimes when people with asthma wheeze, they don’t even realize it because their own breathing sounds so similar to normal speech.

• Coughing: When someone with asthma coughs, it’s usually because their lungs are inflamed and swollen from having too much mucus build up in them (a condition called bronchitis). The result is that the airways become constricted and blocked by mucus plugs which prevent them from being able to take deep breaths easily—which means that there won’t be enough oxygen reaching our blood stream effectively enough for us not only survive but also thrive!

Who can get asthma?

Asthma is a common chronic disease that affects millions of people worldwide. It can affect anyone, but it’s more common in men than women and in children and teenagers.

Asthma causes repeated breathing problems and triggers your lungs to tighten up (bronchospasm). This makes it hard for you to breathe—or even worse, your airways may close completely so that you can’t breathe at all!

If you have asthma, your symptoms will probably improve with time if you take steps such as rest, exercise, avoiding stressors like smoking or exercising too hard and being active outdoors as much as possible when possible instead of indoors where there’s less fresh air available for breathing during exercise sessions which leads us to our next section below where we’ll talk about how treatment options work together hand-in-hand with lifestyle changes so they have better results overall while still allowing room within their daily routines especially when working around school hours because most kids spend part time jobs during the summer months which means they could lose out on those extra hours needed just because everyone needs some extra cash flow coming into their household right now.”

What causes asthma?

Asthma is a chronic disease that causes inflammation in the airways. The lungs are lined with a thin layer of cells called epithelial tissue, which protects them from infection and irritants like pollen. When this tissue becomes inflamed or irritated by an allergen or pollutant, it releases histamine and other chemicals that cause bronchoconstriction (the tightening of your airways).

Other factors may also contribute to asthma:

• Pollution – If you live near busy roads or heavy industry, you’re more likely to develop asthma because air quality can be poor in such areas. This is especially true if you have another respiratory condition like COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease).

• Infections – Some viruses cause symptoms similar to those experienced by someone who has asthma; this includes rhinoviruses, adenoviruses and coronaviruses

How is asthma diagnosed?

When you see a doctor for asthma, he or she will ask about your symptoms and perform a physical exam. Your doctor may order tests to rule out other conditions that could be causing your asthma symptoms as well. These tests include:

• Spirometry (breathing test)

• A chest X-ray

• An ECG or EKG

How do you treat asthma?

The first step in treating asthma is to determine what type of medication you should be taking. If your doctor thinks that a specific medication will help you, then they may prescribe it for you.

If lifestyle changes are what’s needed to treat asthma, here are some things that can help:

• Avoidance of triggers (such as dust, mold and other allergens)

• Smoking cessation

• Allergy shots

Takeaway:

• Asthma is a medical condition that causes airways to become irritated and swollen.

• Asthma can be caused by a variety of things including: allergies, colds and flu (human), cigarette smoke, dust mites/dander (mites), pollution (air quality) and exercise-induced bronchospasm (breathing).

• If you have asthma, you may experience symptoms like coughing or wheezing when you breathe in the air outside your nose or mouth. Your breathing may also feel tight in your chest even when there are no symptoms present at all!

Conclusion

So, the next time you have asthma and need to go to the doctor, remember this article! We hope that it has given you some useful information about asthma and how to treat it.