Triggers and Causes of Asthma are
Not the Same Things
By Mike Herman
For asthma patients the day-to-day management
of the disease becomes an important part of
everyday life. Controlling asthma means paying
careful attention to the causes and triggers
of the asthma.
The "trigger factors", or "triggers",
of asthma are used to describe the things
that can cause an attack in someone who already
has asthma.
It is something that sets off an
attack, but which does not make a patient
asthmatic in the first place.
A "cause" is something without which
an effect (such as asthma) will not happen.
That is, a cause is something without
which the patient would not be asthmatic.
There may be more than one cause for an
asthma attack.
However, there is a lot of confusion
surrounding these terms.
If a patient has an allergy to cats,
dogs, pollen, mould in wallpaper or house
dust mites that cause asthma many describe
them as "triggering an attack".
By demoting causes, by calling them triggers,
makes people think they are not so important,
and that maybe they should just keep using
their inhalers instead of making efforts
to root out the causes of their asthma
and remove these from their environment.
For example, if you don't have asthma,
or your asthma is well controlled, then
a cold will not give you any of the symptoms
of asthma.
So in this sense, it is fair to call
the cold a "trigger factor"
for asthmatics.
But if an asthmatic has an attack whenever
they go near dogs, when dogs have been
the cause of asthma (for instance; the
reason they have asthma is because of
dogs) , going near a dog can trigger an
attack.
In other words, a dog can be a cause
of asthma ‘and' also a trigger of an attack.
Concentrating only on the triggering
of the attacks misses the really important
point that contact with dogs was a cause
of the asthma in the first place.
Asthma sufferers will want to avoid both
causes and triggers of asthma, but the
causes are more serious nature. If there
was no cause and the asthma didn't exist,
the triggers would do absolutely no harm.
Asthma - triggers vs causes ...
• When talking about diseases, it is
important to distinguish between causes
and triggers.
• A trigger for asthma is something which
sets off an attack, but which does not
make you asthmatic in the first place.
• A cause is something without which
an effect (such as asthma) would not be
happening. That is, a cause is something
without which you would not be asthmatic.
Learn More About Symptoms and How You
Can Treat and Live with Asthma at Asthma-Explained.com/asthma-symptoms.html
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Mike_Herman
