World Asthma Day
World Asthma Day is an annual event organized by the Global Initiative for Asthma (GINA) to improve awareness of the illness and try to improve its treatment. It takes place the first Tuesday of May. This year's theme is "You Can Control Your Asthma”, which was last year theme aswell. However this edition will introduce a sub-theme called “It's Time to Control Asthma”. The first World Asthma Day, in 1998, was celebrated in more than 35 countries in conjunction with the first World Asthma Meeting held in Barcelona, Spain.
Asthma is a chronic disease characterized by recurrent attacks of breathlessness and wheezing and it is the most common chronic disease among children. It currently affects 235 million people worldwide, according to the World Health Organization. As some other chronic diseases asthma cannot be cured, but proper diagnosis, treatment and patient education can result in good control and management of the condition. The percentage of population diagnosed with asthma does not change from developed countries to undeveloped ones, the only factor that changes is the percentage with access to treatment.
One of the objectives of the World Asthma Day is also to reduce hospitalizations form asthma attacks (reduce it in a 50% in 5 years). To get to the objective GINA is trying educate patients through these basic advices:
Have a written individualized treatment for your asthma
Take the medications prescribed by your doctor.
Know and avoid things that can trigger asthma attacks.
Learn to recognize the symptoms of an asthma attack.
Know what to do when having an asthma attack.
If you want to know more about the iniciatives for World Asthma Day around you please visit this link. You can also download a complete guide about Asthma.
Medtep Team
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