What is Asthma?
A disease which causes temporary blockage in the air passage due to inflammation and results in difficulty in breathing is called Asthma. It is also known as Bronchial Asthma.
Asthma Symptoms That You Should Know
Here are the top 10 Asthma signs and symptoms:
- Coughing
- Wheezing
- Shortness of breath
- Chest tightness
- Recurrent breathing problem
- Trouble sleeping
- Being moody
- Difficulty in exercising
- Lung function inconsistency as per the peak flow meter
- Blue lips or fingernails
What causes Asthma?
The reasons vary in Ayurveda and contemporary medication. In modern science, the reasons for Asthma are listed below:
- Exercise
- Dust particles, fumes and gases inhalation
- Preserved food
- Drugs
- Allergens: 90% of the asthma patients suffer from allergic asthma, in which an asthma attack is triggered by some sort of allergy.
- Cold weather or cold flu
- Chest or throat trauma
- Air irritants and strong odor
According to Ayurveda, the asthma causes are given below:
- Diet: heavy or dry diet
- Milk, curd
- Non vegetarian food
- Cold water intake
- Salt excess
- Cold and/or damp weather
- Dust, smoke, cold air
- Excessive sex
- Activities
Occurrence rate of Asthma in children and adults
Much like other diseases, asthma patients are also on a rise. This can be contributed to the increasing level of air pollution. 1 in 13 people suffers from asthma. And adult females are more likely to have it than adult males. But it is more prevalent in children as compared to adults. According to the reports of 2015, 1 in 12 children had asthma. In India, an estimated of 15 to 20 million people are asthmatics.
Types of Asthma according to the two sciences
Clinical medicine classifies asthma in two sections:
- Forced expiratory volume
- Peak expiratory flow rate
Ayurveda has its own classifications and it has 4 major parts:
- Maha shawasaa- It is induced by heavy breathing
- Urdhava shawasaa- This includes prolonged upward breathing
- China shawasaa- This occurs when breathing is interrupted
- Tamak shawasaa- It is attributed to darkness behind eyes.
All you need to know about bronchial asthma treatment in Ayurveda
Both Ayurveda and modern medicine have many treatments for asthma but how to cure asthma and asthma treatment in ayurveda will be discussed in detail.
There are two therapies which are used for asthma cure. But each person’s sickness differs from another and hence all factors are taken into consideration before making the action plan for asthma treatment in ayurveda. The two methods are:
- Purification Therapies
- Oleation and Fomentation Procedures
Snehana or oleation therapy includes oil as a form of treatment. Massages are done for the external body with oils such as narayana oil, talispatra oil etc. Afterwards internal oleation takes place in which the patient has to intake the oils, the normally used oil is pure or medicated cow’s ghee as per the direction of asthma treatment in ayurveda.
As for fomentation procedure, also known as swedana, it includes sweating which is induced with the help of a steam box or panda sweda. In panda sweda, a combination of hot rice and some special herbs wrapped in a cloth are used on the body.
Therapeutic vomiting procedure
For asthma treatment in ayurveda, the therapy that can be used is therapeutic vomiting therapy which is also known as vamana. In this treatment of asthma, vomiting is induced for three consecutive days via light breakfast, emetic herb and cool water or milk. If done correctly, it does not cause any discomfort but it is not recommended for the weaker, elderly, cardiac or acutely ill people.
