What is Asthma?
What is asthma?
Asthma is a chronic lung disease.
That means that your child may have it for most of his or her life. Asthma is a condition that can cause breathing problems. These problems come from swelling of the airways in the lungs. Asthma makes the airways too small to let enough air in and out of the lungs.
Asthma causes breathing problems because:
• The muscles around the airways get tight and make the airways too small to let air in and out.
• Mucus builds up in the airways of the lungs and clogs them (just like your nose gets clogged when you have a cold, lungs get clogged, too).
• The airways of the lungs swell.
Asthma can be treated so that your child can live a normal active life.
Click on the arrow below to view our asthma self-management education flipchart, "Let's Take Control of Asthma"
Asthma Basics is an online learning module designed to help individuals with asthma and those who care for them learn more about asthma. The Asthma Basics online learning module is available in English and Spanish.
Asthma for the Healthcare Professional
The purpose of this course is to understand the pathophysiology of asthma and guidelines-based components of asthma care: measures of assessment and monitoring, education for a partnership in asthma care, pharmacologic therapy, and control of environmental and comorbid conditions.