How the smoker's bronchitis manifests - symptoms and treatment

Doctors warn of the dangers of smoking, because it harms the entire body. Among the consequences to which this habit leads, the main place is occupied by the smoker's bronchitis. Its symptoms and treatment are not known to everyone. This disease is chronic, fighting with it requires not only the rejection of cigarettes, but also the course of restorative therapy.

• What is the smoker's bronchitis?
• Causes
• Symptoms of the disease
• Diagnostics
• How to treat a smoker's bronchitis
• Treatment with medicines
• Treatment with folk remedies

What is the smoker's bronchitis?

Bronchitis of a smoker is a disease provoked by prolonged exposure to tobacco smoke. Code of the disease according to the ICD 10 - J44. Smoking is considered one of the most common forms of household addiction. Diseases of the bronchopulmonary system are often caused by this bad habit.

Bronchitis develops gradually, sometimes for decades. Many simply ignore the first alarm signals. First, there are small breathing disorders: dyspnoea with smoking, a feeling of incomplete inspiration. There is a cough, which is repeated all the time. Then signs of chronic smoker's bronchitis progress and diagnosis can be made by any doctor - therapist, pulmonologist.

Specialists are sounding the alarm, because before the disease people of mature age suffered. Today, the percentage of young people who smoke, even children, is increasing dramatically. For the development of severe symptoms of the smoker's bronchitis should pass a minimum of 10-15 years. If fifteen-year-olds start to be addicted to smoking, by the age of 25-30 all signs will show up, the general health will be worse than that of peers.

Interesting! The disease can occur in passive smokers - people who are constantly surrounded by tobacco smoke. In this case, a person can never even hold a cigarette in his or her hands.

Causes

The main cause of bronchitis in long-smoking adults is the toxic effect of tobacco smoke. Its components destroy the bronchial mucosa, which also occurs in passive smokers. The temperature of tobacco smoke reaches 60 degrees Celsius. Therefore, the sensitive mucosa constantly suffers.

How quickly tobacco smoke will damage the airways so that chronic bronchitis will appear, depends on other factors:

• duration of bad habit;
• the number of cigarettes per day;
• human age;
• the state of the immune system;
• accompanying colds, ARVI;
• the state of the ecological situation;
• lifestyle (quality of nutrition, rest, exercise).

The quality of life is a weighty factor. A smoker from a megapolis, working day and night without adequate sleep and rest, will face bronchitis quickly. Another person living near the forest, engaged in sports and leading a measured lifestyle, may not feel symptoms for a long time.

Important! Justifying yourself that smoking can be compensated, for example, by sport, is meaningless. The mucous membrane of the respiratory tract will sooner or later suffer. In addition, other lung diseases from smoking can develop.

Symptoms of the disease

Chronic bronchitis from smoking develops in several stages, each has its own symptomatology. The main symptom of the disease is chronic cough, which is different from colds with a cold, other signs of acute respiratory viral infection. The more intense the disease develops, the more unpleasant sensations and discomfort it causes.

There are three stages of chronic smoker's bronchitis:

1. Cough is observed in the morning, often immediately after awakening. At first this happens occasionally, then daily. When coughing, sputum appears yellow or brown. At this stage of bronchitis there is discomfort when performing excessive physical exertion - there is shortness of breath, a breakdown, dizziness.
2. Changes in the bronchi and lungs are progressing. Add symptoms such as heart palpitations, frequent shortness of breath (not only when doing sports), coughing while smoking. The amount of sputum is changing. Earlier, with morning cough, it was not enough, now more mucus is released. Dyspnea may be so severe that it is accompanied by severe dizziness, rapid breathing, a constant sense of lack of air.
3. The third stage is the heaviest - a strong cough suffers throughout the day, there are seizures, when you can not clear your throat for several minutes. Shortness of breath disturbs even during sleep, a person wakes up at night from suffocation. Each puff of a cigarette develops into a violent cough.

Important! Strong cough brings not only discomfort, it worsens the quality of life in adults. Because of hypoxia, diseases of the cardiovascular system develop, work capacity decreases, and the psychological state worsens.

Diagnostics

It is not difficult to diagnose the smoker's bronchitis, especially in the late stages of the disease. If the patient complained of a persistent cough, the first question of the therapist would be: "Do you smoke?" Even if a person has already given up smoking, but before that he has abused cigarettes, the doctor knows what diagnosis to take. Its main methods are:

1. Anamnesis. The doctor collects a complete picture of the patient's complaints, specifies the nature of the cough, the presence and amount of sputum, changes in body temperature. If there are no obvious symptoms of catarrhal diseases, then cough is associated with smoking.
2. General examination. It implies listening to the lungs, during which the doctor asks the patient to breathe deeply, hold his breath, cough to assess lung function.
3. Blood test. General analysis allows you to finally make sure in the absence of viral and bacterial diseases, determine the nature of the inflammatory process in the body.
4. Sputum analysis. This procedure is done to determine the stage of the smoker's bronchitis, the exclusion of tuberculosis, helps to choose drugs for treatment.

In the second-third stage of the disease, additional studies are carried out. They can be:

• spirography;
• fluorography;
• thorax tomography;
• bronchoscopy.

To determine whether it is possible to cure the smoker's bronchitis at home without medication, it is necessary to conduct a thorough diagnosis. Often people turn to specialists when the disease is in the third stage, in which case antibiotics can not be avoided.

How to treat a smoker's bronchitis

In addition to the use of folk remedies and medications, there are other methods of therapy. They are enough if the bronchitis is at the initial stage, on the late-this is an excellent addition to the main treatment. These include:

1. Exercises of respiratory gymnastics. There are various techniques that teach a former smoker to breathe "in a new way" - right. With their help you can quickly get rid of shortness of breath, coughing attacks, other unpleasant symptoms.
2. Massage. Without special medical skills, doing it yourself is difficult. It is recommended to go to at least a few sessions to a specialist to study the location of the necessary points of the nasopharynx, neck, face.
3. Inhalation by nebulizer. They are conducted at home if there is an apparatus or in a polyclinic, a hospital. Inhalations can completely get rid of the smoker's bronchitis when the disease is in the first stage.
4. Healthy lifestyle. Treatment of the consequences of smoking is necessarily supplemented by the rejection of this harmful habit and the correction of the way of life. It is important to eat right, fully sleep, add daily exercise.

Important! Any treatment will be useless if the person again returns to smoking.

Treatment with medicines

Drug therapy is determined exclusively by a doctor. Often prescribe antibiotic treatment, which is selected based on the results of the survey. If necessary, give additional tests for sensitivity to antibacterial drugs.

Also prescribed bronchodilators - funds that help to sputum. Popular are:

• Lazolvan;
• Ambroxol;
• Mukaltin;
• Ambrogen.

In addition, they are prescribed fortifying agents that restore the normal functioning of the immune system (Bronchomunal). To get rid of coughing attacks, dissolve candies - for example, Dr. Mom. Expectorants take as much time as needed to normalize the sputum production.

Important! After antibiotics, which are almost always prescribed for the smoker's bronchitis, the digestive system may be disrupted. Then the doctor recommends taking probiotics.

Treatment with folk remedies

Use of folk remedies is necessary in combination with drug treatment. They can cope with bronchitis only at the initial stage of the disease. Often used herbal medicine - herbal medicine. For this purpose, take thyme, oregano, chamomile, elecampane, mint, birch buds, althea root, other plants with anti-inflammatory effect. 1 liter of boiling water requires 4 tbsp. l. herbs. The mixture is brewed, insisted, drunk a day.

Such popular recipes are also popular:

• compresses on the chest of honey, butter;
• inhalation at home - from potatoes, salts with iodine, eucalyptus, raspberry branches;
• infusion of honey on alcohol (used only for treatment in adults);
• mixture of radish with honey inside;
• milk with cocoa butter, soda.

These are just some folk remedies that have the same effect as expectorant pills. Before using any of them, you need to make sure that there is no allergic reaction to the products used.

Bronchitis of a smoker is a serious disease with a cough, painful sensations in the chest, discomfort during breathing. Treatment is possible only after completely giving up smoking, conducting diagnostics. Drug therapy can be supplemented by the use of folk remedies.