What happens during an asthma attack? When your asthma flares up, it’s time to take fast action. Here's why.
Deep in your lungs, an exchange takes place that your life depends on. Carbon dioxide moves out of your blood and life-giving oxygen moves into your blood. This exchange takes place in the tiny round air sacs called alveoli.
Your alveoli are at the end of your bronchiole tubes. Bronchiole tubes branch out from your two bronchi, which join to form your windpipe. You can picture this as an upside-down tree.
The windpipe is the trunk, branching to two bronchi, then smaller bronchiole tubes, and finally the alveoli are the leaves.
When your asthma flares up, your airways react to something—cold air, a virus, smoke, an allergy trigger—and they start to swell, tighten and clog. This makes it hard for your lungs to create that important oxygen and carbon dioxide exchange, and breathing becomes difficult.
It's an Emergency When:
- You don’t improve after you’ve taken two treatments of your quick-relief medicines.
- You have blue lips or fingernails.
- You are struggling to breathe, talk or stay awake.
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