Challenge the limits of the human body! Can people with asthma engage in high-intensity sports?

Expert of this article: Wang Qian, attending physician, Department of Infectious Diseases, First Hospital of Hebei Medical University

This article was reviewed by Li Jiangtao, Associate Chief Physician, Department of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Hebei Chest Hospital

On February 10, the men's singles free skating final of the Beijing Winter Olympics ended. Two-time Winter Olympic champion and Japanese star Yuzuru Hanyu ranked fourth with 188.06 points.

△ Yuzuru Hanyu attempts 4A

Yuzuru Hanyu is known as the "King of Ice", but who would have thought that such an outstanding athlete is actually an asthma patient.

Many people believe that asthma patients cannot do strenuous exercise, but this is not true. Today, let’s learn some knowledge about asthma.

1. What is asthma?

Bronchial asthma is a chronic airway inflammatory disease and an allergic disease accompanied by bronchospasm.

The main symptoms are recurrent episodes of wheezing, shortness of breath, chest tightness or coughing, which often occur and worsen at night and/or early in the morning.

Most cases of asthma are related to allergies, exposure to irritating odors, allergic foods and drugs, but some asthma patients have no connection with allergies.

2. Can asthma patients not exercise?

Having asthma does not mean you cannot exercise. On the contrary, proper exercise can improve asthma.

Asthma is a chronic respiratory disease, which is divided into acute attack period and stable remission period. Physical exercise is not recommended during acute attack, but asthma patients in the stable period can exercise, and even encourage patients in the stable period to exercise appropriately to enhance their physical fitness.

3. What should asthma patients pay attention to before and after exercise?

Exercise for asthma patients has its own special features:

Choice of sports

You can choose from a variety of sports such as skating, skiing, rowing, baseball, and swimming (try to choose an outdoor well-ventilated swimming pool that is not disinfected with chlorine). However, some strenuous sports that require a lot of sweating and calorie consumption, such as mountain climbing, long-distance running, and sprinting, are not suitable.

Suitable exercise environment

Outdoor sports are not suitable for areas with severe air pollution, heavy traffic, or cold and dry winters. Swimming pools with excessively high chlorine concentrations and environments that may contain more allergens such as pollen may also induce asthma.

Reasonable arrangement of exercise intensity

It is recommended to exercise 2-4 times a week, for about half an hour each time, and the exercise intensity should be appropriate so as not to cause asthma-related symptoms such as chest tightness and shortness of breath.

Another very important point is that asthma patients should exercise when regular drug treatment reaches a stable period. Exercise is not recommended during an acute attack.

4. Misunderstandings about asthma

During the consultation process at the respiratory clinic, we found that many patients and their families had deep-rooted misunderstandings about asthma:

Is asthma a childhood disease that will go away when you grow up?

Asthma can occur at any age.

Many people develop the disease in childhood. As they grow older and their immune systems improve, their asthma is well controlled by the time they reach adolescence and adulthood, and they rarely suffer from the disease.

As we age, our body’s immunity declines, and we may experience acute asthma attacks again under the stimulation of various triggers.

This requires asthma patients to always pay attention in their lives to avoid contact with irritating odors, allergenic foods and medicines, and try to reduce the occurrence of respiratory infections (such as colds).

Is asthma an infectious disease?

Asthma is not contagious, but there is a certain genetic tendency for the occurrence of asthma.

Therefore, it is common for one parent in a family to have asthma and the children also suffer from asthma, which makes people feel that asthma is contagious, but in fact asthma is not contagious. There is only a certain tendency in heredity, and it is not the case that if one parent has asthma, the children will definitely have asthma.

Mistaking asthma attacks for colds and tracheitis

Asthma attacks often present with chest tightness, sneezing, coughing, clear runny nose, etc., and are often mistaken for "colds or bronchitis."

If the above-mentioned discomfort symptoms occur repeatedly, you should go to the respiratory department in time to complete lung function tests to determine whether it is an asthma attack, a common cold, or bronchitis.

Two Misunderstandings about Medication for Asthma Treatment

(1) Some people believe that asthma treatment requires high doses of hormones. Some people are overly concerned about the side effects of hormones and stop using hormone-containing sprays when their symptoms improve slightly.

Clinically, most asthma patients only need low doses of inhaled hormones to achieve long-term stable control. There is no need to use excessive amounts of hormones. On the contrary, large amounts of hormones are not conducive to asthma control.

The first-line medication for asthma treatment is inhaled hormones, which act directly on the airway mucosa and have few systemic side effects. Therefore, asthma patients do not need to be overly resistive to hormones, and they must not stop using inhaled sprays on their own.

(2) Over-reliance on antibiotics. Antibiotics are used for every acute attack, but lung function tests are not taken seriously.

The airway inflammation of asthma is not the respiratory infection caused by bacteria, viruses and other microorganisms as commonly understood, so antibiotics are not necessary drugs for the treatment of asthma. Only when there is a bacterial infection do reasonable antibiotics need to be used.

The importance of lung function should be emphasized in the treatment and chronic follow-up of asthma. Pulmonary function tests can evaluate whether asthma treatment has reached a stable stage and guide patients' long-term medication plans.

Seeking a “radical cure” in treating asthma?

As asthma is characterized by repeated acute attacks, many patients are troubled and seek "secret recipes" everywhere to cure asthma. However, these "secret recipes" often contain a large amount of hormones, and long-term oral administration is not conducive to asthma control. In the event of an acute attack, the effect of hospitalization becomes increasingly poor.

The ultimate goal of asthma treatment is to control asthma in a stable period for a long time with small doses of inhaled hormones so that daily work and life are not affected, rather than pursuing a cure.

Asthma is a common chronic disease of the respiratory system

Correct understanding of asthma

Receive long-term formal treatment

Appropriate exercise can also be performed during the stable period

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