When I was a kid through teenager, the so called medical experts who were at a loss to explain the cause of Asthma, blamed emotional problems as the cause. They were giving the victim a guilt trip. Being a natural born skeptic, I didn't let it bother me.

Now, the so-called medical experts blame too sterile a childhood environment causing an immune system deficiency. That's a guilt trip for the parents. They don't bother to explain if it is a too sterile environment, why the huge increase in Asthmatic children in slum tenements. They are definitely not sterile. There they have theorized that it has something to do with roaches. I do know that the odor of a crushed roach, not uncommon here in N Florida, will aggravate my Asthma.

Early in my career and suffering from stage freight even in front of small groups, I had to present a paper to an audience that must have been close to 1000. Worse yet, a national expert in the field of my paper was the session moderator. No Asthma, but I did pre-dose on whatever the medication was in those days. I did have a severe pounding heart and a severe erg to run a way.

Al

well, saw my doctor today... EKG was normal and looked the same as one i had a couple of yrs ago. had chest x-ray and dr said looked good to him, but will send off to radiologist for checking. go this friday for echocardiogram and next thurs for pulmonary function testing.

that's all for now. will update later after i get some results back.

karen.

Could it also be the fact that he was exercising prior to the ingestion of water? I mean was his observation properly controlled? Can he just sit down somewhere totally relaxed and feeling good and drink a few gulps of cold water and incite an asthma attack? I doubt it. What did he eat that day? What was the mold count? Did he have contact with any animals? The list goes on.

I am not doubting his beliefs or his observation, merely the causation of what he felt. People get diagnosed with diseases at the doctor's office. This doesn't mean doctor's offices cause the disease. Correlation is not causation.

And as to your citations.... Wikipedia doesn't count for anything. Anyone can submit or edit those articles. And I read the Pubmed article.....it was a review article not one with ANY data. They proposed a possible hypothesis based on and I quote "circumstantial evidence." I have read thousands of peer reviewed journal articles in biology and chemistry and never have I heard someone use that term. I can pretty much propose any hypothesis I want. It is meaningless. And even if that article was in any way a decent article, no where do they mention the drinking of cold water causing an asthma attack.

It is good to be a skeptic. But both experts are right. It is well documented that being exposed to dust mite allergens and cockroach allergens can cause a sensitization. Repeated exposure will incite an asthma attack. This is true for many allergens such as from the skin of many haired animals. Over exposure can lead to sensitization and attacks.

The other extreme is having too naive of an immune system that over reacts to allergens.

I never suggested I had proof of the mechanism; it was more proof of concept and an attempt to make you understand that listening to people whom you consider naïve is still important. Learn not to reject data only because it doesn’t fit your current model or level of understanding.

You never did search about Vagus cooling and cardio pulmonary interactions did you? Instead you attempted to weaken the opposition’s credibility; the lowest form of debate. The Wiki article was just to let you know about the Vagus nerves existence and connectivity; which your condescending comments made me think you were unaware of. If you were aware of the connectivity you probably wouldn’t have referred to the reported cold drink effect as “utter nonsense” coming from the “totally clueless.”

FYI you are not the only person on the forum who works in science; do not assume you are addressing an ignorant audience.

Both experts can't be right; It can' be due to both "too clean" and "too dirty". That doesn't make sense to me. My suspicion that in a few years both concepts will bite the dust and new theory will be hyped.

How long have we been told to take an aspirin a day to reduce the risk of heart attacks? Well no more as if you read the excerpt below from an article in the NYT you'll see that we were more at risk and not less.

This happens regularly in the health/medical/nutrition research field. I worked in R & D for years, I've never seen so much bad research so outlandishly hyped and so often just plain wrong. Name the affliction or the nutrient and it's first A, then B then none of the above.

Luckily, like many Asthmatics, I'm allergic to aspirin, so I didn't take the daily aspirin. I had a doctor try to give me a prescription for a strong blood thinner (Plavex?) just because I couldn't take the daily aspirin. I tore that one up too. He was willing to subject me to the risks and side affects of a dangerous drug because he wasn't sufficiently skeptical.

Let the patient be ware.

Al


Common painkillers raise heart risk
By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor Mon Feb 26, 4:20 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Popular painkillers such as aspirin, ibuprofen and acetaminophen can raise blood pressure and thus the risk of heart disease among men, U.S. researchers reported on Monday.

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Men who took such drugs for most days in a week were about one-third more likely to be diagnosed with high blood pressure than men not taking them, the researchers found.

Their findings, published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, reinforce a study published in 2002 that these commonly used drugs raise blood pressure in women.

"This is a potentially preventable cause of high blood pressure," Dr. John Forman of Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, who led the study, said in a statement.

Millions of people take the painkillers as pills every day to treat headaches, arthritis, muscle pulls and other aches and pains.

"These are the three most commonly used drugs in the United States," Dr. Gary Curhan, who also worked on the study, said in a telephone interview.

For their study, the researchers looked at a continuing study of male health professionals. After they filtered out everyone who already had high blood pressure and other problems, they had 16,000 men whose records they checked for a 4 year period.

Men who took acetaminophen (paracetamol), sold generically and under the Tylenol brand name, six or seven days a week were 34 percent more likely to be diagnosed with high blood pressure than men who did not take analgesics.

Men who took aspirin that regularly were 26 percent more likely to have high blood pressure than non-users. For non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, or NSAIDS, which include ibuprofen and naproxen, the increased risk was 38 percent.

SPACERS WORK!! I got mine when riding w/a friend, gasping wheezing and coughing...and having him turn to me and ask where my inhaler was....had one years earlier...but grew up w/a very tough minded stiff upper lip english mother who didn't believe in asthma or other wimpy things like allergies!! So long story short I have learned to work thru most of my EIA (and non-E A!) simply by trying to stay calm and just breath until my lungs will finally allow me to fill up. But riding all the time now...sometimes that just ain't enough. Plus scares others when they hear you coming up behind them! SO....on this ride he gives me HIS inhaler w/this "Thing" attached...explains how to use it...amazing difference! No icky taste in the mouth, no stomach upset and lungs that work!!! Mine cost about $17 at the pharmacy and all I had to do was ask for it....they knew I had an inhaler. I don't know why the hell know one tells you about these things! Thank god for otherw w/asthma! The spacer also allows you to pull it in to your lungs in a more paced fashion which means better distribution of the meds!.

It’s amazing how much better meter dose inhalers (MDI) work when you use a spacer (holding camber). Spacers now days can be small units that hold 2 MDI and are about the size of a deck of cards. Everyone please contact your local American Lung Association for more information about the use of spacers and/or asthma education for family and yourself.

well, minor update: saw cardiologist and had a stress echo done today. he gave my heart an A++++ and said it was working on all 8 cylinders!

can you get the spacers without a prescription?

Glad to hear that your heart is in excellent shape, now your job is to keep it that way.

Let your fingers do the walking, try calling the pharmacy and see what they say about the spacer.

had to get a 'scrip for the spacer. got it this evening and will be using in the morning before my group ride. hope it helps.

got the spacer and used it before this morning's group ride. that stuff wired me! i think i do have some sort of breathing problem cause on this ride, i felt absolutely great! no troubles breathing and to top it off, i finished the 42.7mi at an 18mph average! never have done that, usually in the 16mph range. damn, i feel good for a change.

wolfpack, have you been to a Dr about the Exercise Induced Asthma? When I suspected that's what I was suffering, I brought it up with my GP, who immediately sent me for lung tests (you breathe into a machine) and contacted a cardio-pulmonary specialist. My results went to both my GP and the specialist, I believe I talked to my GP about them first, and then a week or so later went to see the specialist, and had a good talk with him about my entire cardio-pulmonary system.

If you are still in the "i think i do have some sort of breathing problem" stage, go have it checked!!

i think if you check a coupla previous posts, you'll see that i've seen my GP, who sent me to a cardiologist (who said my heart is perfectly ok) and i do the lung function test this coming thursday. i've had all of this stuff done before, back in 2001, when i was having the same problems, so i'm familiar with the tests.

Looks like there's a fair bit of discussion here on the effects of albutamol in healthy individuals to float this one out there...

I believe fenoterol has been shown to not only be an effective beta-adrenergic treatment for asthma but also as an agonist of erthyropoeitin, raising EPO levels 50%. It almost sounds like a designer drug for professional cyclists. Have any of the asthmatics (or others here) tried fenoterol? And if so, was there are obvious benefit?

I too have mild EIA.
This is my non-medical trained technique that I use in temps 50 or below, your mileage may vary.

I start off wearing a neck gaiter pulled over my mouth and nose to warm the air. After about 15 min, I can pull the neck gaiter off and can push hard with no wheezing. This is the first winter I’ve tried it and had little or no breathing problems.