Essay on Asthma

Asthma

4 Aug 2008

Asthma is a killer; it takes the lives of 11 people every day in America. There are more Americans suffering from asthma than ever. Even though this invisible killer can be deadly it is treatable. This chronic disease has been around for centuries affecting the lives of many. With close to over twenty years experience I still seem to have the same knowledge, or lack there of, of this phantom. I have had many personal experiences with asthma throughout my life. I can remember my first attack when I was six years old; I just woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t breathe. I took in full breaths but they were never enough. As if an invisible phantom strangling me from the inside I felt like I was dying from lack of oxygen. There were long periods of time when I didn’t need any medication and other times when I had to depend on it for dear life. Yet I am fully active being able to out run some of my peers. There are few who know the disease I hold within my chest because in my work environment weakness could mean the death of you or you causing the death of someone else. I have dealt with this manageable, deadly, and still misunderstood disease all my life. Even with all the technology we seem to have.

Asthma has a very long history being mentioned by physicians’ of numerous centuries. Around 460-360 B.C. Hippocrates and his school mentioned asthma in the Corpus Hippocraticum. Derived from the Greek verb “aazein” asthma means to breath with an open mouth, to pant. Asthma was not noticed just by the people of Greece the Egyptians also took notice of it. “Moses Maimonides, a renowned 12th century rabbi, philosopher, and physician practiced in the court of Saladin (1137-1193), sultan of Egypt and Syria (1).” Maimonides was not only able to diagnose his patients but he figured out the triggers that caused an attack and...