Whether it's hiking, cycling, or another outdoor activity, Lori Armijo exercises every day, but in her 40s she had to add something new to her workouts, an inhaler.
To her surprise, she had developed asthma as an adult. But sometimes that persistent cough is a sign of asthma. Lori is one of more than 17 million adults with asthma, one of the most common chronic respiratory diseases in the U.S., and doctors believe many more have this condition but don't realize it.
According to a new survey by National Jewish Health, most people know that wheezing and shortness of breath are symptoms of asthma, but barely half know that trouble sleeping is a warning sign of adult-onset asthma, and only slightly more realize that chest pain and persistent cough are symptoms.
So a lot of people are running around with asthma and don't know it. Dr. David Buthers says that one in every 200 adults are newly diagnosed with asthma every year, and while children with this disease might have more common symptoms, adults who develop asthma typically have some of the less recognized symptoms.
It's probably more than half the time that they don't have the traditional symptoms or they don't have all of the symptoms, and so it's not as straightforward.
And so I think the diversity of asthma and how it shows up and how it feels to the patient is much greater in the adulthood than in childhood.
But with proper treatment and careful management, adults with asthma can live an active lifestyle.
Run, bike, walk, hike, it's a really great thing.
At National Jewish Health in Denver, this is Clark Powell reporting.
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