Hello and welcome to the Zero to Finals podcast.

My name is Tom and in this episode I'm going to be talking to about acute asthma.

If you want to follow along with written notes on this topic,

you can follow along at zero definals.com

slash medicine slash acute asthma or in the respiratory section of the zero to finals medicine book.

Let's get straight into it.

An acute exacerbation of asthma is characterized by a rapid deterioration in the symptoms.

And this could be triggered by any of the typical asthma triggers,

things like infection, exercise or cold weather.

And the presentation is of progressively worsening shortness of breath,

and you'll find that they use their accessory muscles because they're having to try very hard to get air in and out of their lungs.

The respiratory rate might be raised, which we call takaknear.

There should be a symmetrical expiratory wheeze on auscultation,

and the chest can sound tight when you listen,

with reduced air entry throughout.

There's some systems we can use to grade the severity of an acute asthma attack.

One of the key measurements that we use in order to grade the severity of asthma

is the peak expiratory flow rate or peak flow.

And if this is 50 to 75% of their predicted value,

this is a moderate asthma attack or moderate exacerbation of asthma.

If the peak flow is 33 to 50% of predicted,

or the respiratory rates above 25, their heart rate's above 110,

...