Bronchitis
Including Asthmatic Bronchitis or Bronchial Asthma
Recommended Program - No More Bronchitis
The main points to this page are that
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Bronchitis can be beaten.
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How to beat it so you do not keep getting it over and over again.
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When you have bronchitis your breathing system gets smaller.
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To live as long and as healthy as possible you need to offset that "shrinkage" with specific breathing exercises, techniques, proper digestion, and diet you will learn in our No More Bronchitis Program.
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Emphysema and chronic bronchitis are the primary Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease
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Asthma is either related or mistaken for bronchitis in many instances. Focusing on bronchitis the way we do will also help the asthma. The instructions with the Fundamentals video 176 will explain that.
Chronic bronchitis is the most common condition in the category of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). It has been estimated that 14 to 15 million persons in the United States have COPD and that of those, 12 million have chronic bronchitis. Although emphysema is sometimes considered synonymous with COPD, it accounts for only a minority of patients with COPD; indeed, it is often seen in conjunction with chronic bronchitis. It is also worth noting that unlike chronic bronchitis, emphysema is a pathologic rather than a clinical diagnosis.
Chronic bronchitis is an infectious condition. Lowered immunity from poor diet, prolonged stress, bacteria transferred from other humans, UNDIGESTED Foods, POOR Elimination, and MANY Cough Suppressants (hide cause and deal only with symptoms) , Antibiotics (kill friendly bacteria that staves off lung infections), weakened immune system , Toxicity that hinders lungs function and invites accumulation of cellular debris, smoking.
It worsens over years and will not go away on its own. The person becomes increasingly open to infections which further weaken the immune system possibly becoming life threatening. Antibiotics taken help less and less as they destroy the healthy bacteria and allow the recurrence of unhealthy bacteria, inviting the return of bronchitis.
Acute bronchitis , inflammation of the bronchial tree, is generally almost as self limiting, like a bad chest cold, with eventual subsiding to undetectable levels. I say "undetectable" because the shrinkage of the breathing system tends to invite further episodes. This shrinking, surfactant (mucous type lining of alveoli) compromise, and or reduction in expansion/contraction flexibility is hard to detect. One way to measure it is by regularly taking the breathing tests plus the rib expansion test and a few others included in the manual. Or if you are a singer you may notice occasionally or frequently that you are having trouble reaching high notes or low tone sustains.
Repeated bouts of bronchitis yearly or more often indicate the chronic type that includes accelerated shrinkage.
Symptoms
Acute Bronchitis symptoms like a deep chest cold, slight fever; inflammation, weak voice, limited speech, shortness of breath, headache, nausea, lung and body aches; hacking dry cough or mucous producing cough.
Chronic bronchitis and/or asthmatic bronchitis: bronchial tubes become inflamed, and mucous becomes thicker and more profuse: difficult breathing and shortness of breath from clogged airways: repeated attacks of acute bronchitis: chest congestion: mucous producing and wheezing that lasts for several weeks or more: fatigue, weakness and weight loss; low grade lung infection, general malaise. Trouble reaching high notes or low tone sustains while singing may be an indicator of pending trouble.
COMMON CAUSES:
Poor breathing balance & coordination, high mucous forming and acid forming
diet; suppressive "cold
preparations"; lack of exercise inviting poor circulation; smoking;
air-born toxins; immunity
weakness, stress and fatigue.
Insufficient activity encourages poor respiration and elimination. Toxins build up in the lungs and colon and create tension, exhaustion, skin and hair problems, and pale complexion. Complexion often changes within minutes after breathing is improved.
NATURAL APPROACHES
Foods
Elimination
Herbs
Homeopathics
Cleansers
Nutritionals
Cough suppressants
Avoid cough suppressants. Coughing helps get rid of mucous. Wet coughing is
productive coughing.
Chronic coughing will cause loss of shortness of breath that will not be recovered without specific techniques and exercises such as those contained the Secrets of Optimal Natural Breathing Manual.
ANTIBIOTICS
Background: Despite the findings in controlled trials that antibiotics provide limited benefit in the treatment of acute bronchitis, physicians frequently prescribe antibiotics for acute bronchitis. The aim of this study was to determine whether certain patient or provider characteristics could predict antibiotic use for acute bronchitis in a system where antibiotic use had already been substantially reduced through quality-improvement efforts.
Methods: A retrospective chart review was performed in an academic family medicine training center that had previously instituted a quality-improvement project to reduce antibiotic prescribing for acute bronchitis. Patients who had acute bronchitis diagnosed during an 18-month period and who had no other secondary diagnosis for respiratory distress or a condition that would justify antibiotics were selected from a computerized-record database and included in the study (n = 135). Charts were reviewed to document patient symptoms, physical findings, provider and patient characteristics, and treatment.
Results: Thirty-five (26%) patients received antibiotics for their acute bronchitis. Adults were more likely to receive antibiotics than children (34% vs 3%, P < .001). Analysis of 20 different symptoms and physical findings showed that symptoms and signs were poor predictors of antibiotic use. Likewise, no significant differences were found based on prescribing habits of individual providers or provider level of training.
Conclusion: In a setting where antibiotic use for acute bronchitis had been decreased through an ongoing quality-improvement effort, it did not appear that providers selectively used antibiotics for patients with certain symptoms or signs. Other factors, such as nonclinical cues, might drive antibiotic prescribing even after clinical variation is suppressed. [J Am Board Fam Pract 13(6):398-402, 2000. © 2000 American Board of Family Practice]
Recommended Program - No More Bronchitis
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