Asthma as a Widespread and Persistent Inflammatory Illness - Essay Example

'Asthma as a Widespread and Persistent Inflammatory Illness' is a marvelous example of a paper on the respiratory system. 
Asthma is a widespread and persistent inflammatory illness of the airways attributed to a number of reappearing signs and reversible airway blockage. The frequently known signs entail breathing with difficulty, coughs and chest stiffness. Asthma is believed to be brought about by hereditary or environmental reasons. The article selected presents a number of vocabularies and terms on the verge of explaining the problems facing patients living with asthma and the current misconceptions. The article introduces overdiagnosis, undertreatment, overtreatment, complacency and a battery of tests. All these vocabularies are used in the article to support the controversies surrounding asthma, which include proper determination and management of asthma.

The term overdiagnosis stands for an illness that will not display symptoms or death for the duration of the patient’s life. It is also used to describe a consequence of checking for premature aspects of an illness. Regardless of early illness checking, which helps to save lives, normal people may be converted into patients, further leading to risky treatments. Undertreatment stands for an insufficient treatment also used to describe a form of treatment offered under another treatment. Overtreatment implies treatment or health care services offered beyond the required amounts. A battery of new tests stands for a series of tests that must be conducted in order to ascertain the presence of an illness, such as asthma (Price 1). Finally, complacency stands for a feeling of contentment or gratification.

In order to comprehend the intricacies of asthma, it is important to learn how the airways function. The airways are cylinders that move air in and out of the lungs. Individuals who develop asthma have swollen airways, which lead to increased pain and sensitivity. In this regard, the airways begin to act in response to the movement of air mixed with irritants, such as dust or pungent chemicals. There are instances when asthma signs are weak and may fade subsequent to negligible treatment with asthma medication. However, there are times when the signs resurface leading to emergency situations. According to the respiratory chapter of the book, when extra signs appear, then it could be an asthma attack. Treating asthma, when the first symptoms appear helps, manage it, considering that critical asthma attacks can be terminal.

The irritation of the airways leads to the tightening of the surrounding muscles, leading to the narrowing of the airways. In this regard, little air flows in and out of the lungs. The airways can continue to narrow on account of the swelling leading to an abnormal increase in mucus that surrounds the airways. The mucus makes the situation even worse by further blocking the airways, leading to more breathing difficulty. The patient begins to develop wheezing sounds as they breathe with difficulty. This cycle can lead to a number of asthma signs that come up each time the airways narrows.

In conclusion, the article disputes misconceptions on the subject of diagnosing and treating asthma. The main issues of concern are overdiagnosis, overtreatment, undertreatment and poor series of tests. Regardless of the respiratory experts putting forward the misconceptions published by the NICE, there is a need to have a clear understanding of the intricacies of asthma. Proper diagnosis should be conducted, and asthma patients should be integrated into proper treatment immediately. Ultimately, medical practitioners should enable people to understand how to determine the right symptoms and further how to manage the illness.