Student Health

‘JUST A BIT OF ASTHMA’: DIFFERENT TERMS FOR ASTHMA AND WHAT THEY MEAN

From Asthma Australia:

Severe asthma, thunderstorm asthma and allergic asthma. It’s all asthma but the experience and symptoms can be different...

When people call 1800 ASTHMA with “just a bit of asthma”, it raises the concern of Asthma Educator Gemma Crawley.

The nurse and asthma expert knows there is a range of different symptoms and experiences of asthma, a lifelong condition of the airways, but when people are waking at night more than twice a week or not being able to do activities the way they used to it means their asthma requires more management.

“Just a bit of asthma can often mean their asthma is not well managed,” she says. “If they don’t do anything about it, then it can lead to a severe flare-up. And that means time off work, time off school, and other health costs.”

There are a few different types of asthma. Often it is a naming issue, for example allergic asthma can be a form of intermittent asthma. Nocturnal asthma is a way of describing someone whose asthma is experienced at night. But it is all still asthma.

There can also be confusion around the terms flare-up and attack. We use flare-up to describe when the symptoms of asthma are coming on. This could be breathlessness or wheeze, or perhaps waking in the night. An attack is a severe set of symptoms that can be life threatening.

Act on symptoms when they start to avoid them getting worse.

To make it easier to understand some of the asthma terms you may have heard from your doctor and understand their differences, we’ve explained them on our website and provided a quick overview on some of the common terms...

Asthma at School

If your child has been diagnosed with asthma, you will need to provide the school an up-to-date Victorian Schools Asthma Plan which has been completed by a doctor - this should be done annually. There are different Vic School Plans available depending on the reliever medication and whether or not a spacer is used.