Symptoms:

Asthma symptoms vary in severity from occasional mild bouts of breathlessness to daily wheezing that lasts even when a patient takes large doses of medication. After exposure to asthma triggers, symptoms rarely develop abruptly but progress over a period of hours or days. Occasionally, the airways have become seriously obstructed by the time the patient calls the doctor.

The classic symptoms of an asthma attack include:

• Wheezing when breathing out is nearly always present during an attack. Usually the attack begins with wheezing and rapid breathing, and, as it becomes more severe, all breathing muscles become visibly active.
• Shortness of breath (dyspnea). Shortness of breath is a major source of distress in patients with asthma. However, the severity of this symptom does not always reflect the degree to which lung function is impaired. Some patients are not even aware that they are experiencing shortness of breath. These patients are at particular risk for very serious and even life-threatening asthma attacks, since they are less conscious of symptoms.
• Coughing. In some people, the first symptom of asthma is a nonproductive cough. Some patients find this cough even more distressing than wheezing or sleep disturbances.
• Chest tightness or pain. Initial chest tightness without any other symptoms may be an early indicator of a serious attack.
• Rapid heart rate
• Sweating

The end of an attack is often marked by a cough that produces thick, stringy mucus. After an initial acute attack, inflammation lasts for days to weeks, often without symptoms. (The inflammation itself must still be treated, however, because it usually causes relapse.)

Symptoms of a Life-Threatening Attack

The following signs and symptoms may indicate a life-threatening situation:

• As the chest labors to bring enough air into the lungs, breathing often becomes shallow.
• Lacking enough oxygen, the skin becomes bluish.
• The flesh around the ribs of the chest appears to be sucked in.
• The patient may begin to lose consciousness.

Asthma often progresses very slowly to a serious condition or may develop to a fatal or near-fatal attack within a few minutes. It is very difficult to predict when an attack will become very serious.

Exercise-Induced Asthma

Exercise-induced asthma (EIA) is a limited form of asthma in which exercise triggers coughing, wheezing, or shortness of breath. This condition generally occurs in children and young adults, most often during intense exercise in cold dry air. Symptoms are generally most intense about 10 minutes after exercising and then gradually resolve.

EIA is triggered only by exercise and is distinct from ordinary allergic asthma in that it does not produce a long duration of airway activity, as allergic asthma does. (However, some people have both forms of asthma.) People who have only EIA do not appear to need long-term maintenance therapy.

Nocturnal Asthma

Asthma occurs primarily at night (nocturnal asthma) in as many as 75% of patients with asthma. Attacks often occur between 2 and 4 a.m. Some doctors believe that nocturnal asthma may actually be a unique form, with its own specific biologic mechanisms occurring only at night.