Empowering Parents through Asthma Education

Andrea's inspiring journey from interior design to public health is a testament to the power of personal experience in shaping professional paths. Prompted by her son's asthma diagnosis and the challenges they faced navigating the healthcare system, Andrea became a Certified Health Education Specialist and Asthma Educator. Through her story, we uncover the emotional resilience required to manage a child's chronic illness and the unwavering trust in parental instincts that guided her towards advocating for better asthma education and specialized care.

Medicine shaming and the prevalence of misleading health advice online pose significant challenges for those managing chronic conditions like asthma. Andrea shares her candid experiences with unsolicited advice and the pitfalls of miracle cures, highlighting the critical importance of consulting healthcare professionals and relying on accurate, reputable sources. We also reflect on outdated misconceptions about asthma and the necessity for precise diagnoses and treatments, especially considering the pervasive myths from the 1980s that continue to influence public perception.

Creating an asthma-friendly home is crucial for effective management of the condition, and Andrea offers practical strategies to achieve this. From reducing allergens with specific cleaning techniques to ensuring family members are prepared for medical emergencies, she provides actionable tips to maintain a healthy environment. We also delve into the importance of balancing asthma management with quality of life, discussing how to enjoy simple pleasures while minimizing health risks. Andrea's insights empower listeners to make informed decisions that positively impact their lives and those of their loved ones.

A few reasons you should care about asthma:

• Asthma is the most common chronic disease among children 
• Asthma is the #1 cause of missed school days (and kids with asthma grow up to be adults with asthma.)
• 10 people in the U.S. die each day from asthma 

I love the famous statistics quote by Paul Badeur, "Statistics are human beings with the tears wiped off."

• American Lung Association https://www.lung.org/
• Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America https://aafa.org/
• Allergy & Asthma Networ

Are you living with a chronic illness and want to make your voice heard? Rare Patient Voice connects patients and caregivers with research opportunities—so you can share your experiences and get paid for your time! Your insights help drive real change in healthcare.

Let's Get Started - Rare Patient Voice

🎙 Living with a rare disease or chronic illness can feel isolating—but you are not alone. Find Your Rare is more than just a brand—it’s a movement. From empowering apparel to real, raw conversations, they’re here to remind you that your story matters. Because being RARE its your superpower. Explore, join & wear your rare with pride at FindYourRare.com

Chapters

• 0:00 Design to Public Health Journey
• 7:23 Medication Shamers and Asthma Misconceptions
• 11:19 Asthma Myths and Management Program
• 20:15 Asthma and Allergy Home Management
• 26:37 Asthma Management and Family Support
• 32:48 Asthma Management and Lifestyle Adjustments
• 37:34 Asthma Management Tips and Strategies

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:08

Welcome back to Merle's Little Needs Sisters. We are thrilled to have Andrea, a Certified Health Education Specialist and Certified Asthma Educator. Her dedication to asthma education spans local, state, national and global levels, including leading programs like award-winning Asthma Home Visit Program. Andrea, welcome to the pod. How you doing.

Speaker 2: 0:31

Thank you y'all, I'm doing well. Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1: 0:34

We did a little introduction and you know the stuffy bio, the stuffy bio. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Speaker 2: 0:41

My original degree was in interior design, which I still love because you know I got to keep my skills sharp. But love, love, love what I do in public health. I'll help anytime, anybody anywhere, anytime. On vacation, I help somebody in Hawaii. Love to travel, love Paris it's my favorite city. I love Hawaii. We just rescued two ginger kittens and I know people say you cannot have pets if you have allergies and asthma. Well, we've all had allergy shots and I'm never going to be a grandma, so the two little kittens are going to be my grandbabies and we love them and we just keep a really clean house, stay up on the allergy medicines and all that. But yeah, I'm a sucker for kittens, definitely.

Speaker 3: 1:23

Do you mind sharing a bit of background of how your son's asthma diagnosis inspired you to shift from interior design to public health and asthma education?

Speaker 2: 1:33

Always an interesting story and people want to know what's going on behind the scenes. When my middle son was five, I noticed that he was always a lot sicker than his older brother and he would get sick. It would last a lot longer that mother's intuition. You know your kids and you know something's wrong. And this is way back in January of 2000. So 25 years ago I had my little article from Parents Magazine and I took that to the pediatrician because that's what we used back then, because the internet wasn't really a big thing back then, a lot of people didn't have computers. I said to my doctor I'm really concerned. This child has asthma and he shows all the symptoms here. Something is off with this kid. He said oh no, it's a virus. About two weeks later I took him back to the doctor. He was sick again. He looked terrible, his skin was pale, he had dark circles under his eyes, he was really lethargic and that mom instinct, like something's wrong with my child, took him to the pediatrician and all of a sudden, instead of saying, oh honey, it's just a virus, but you know, I'm a doctor, the room swarms with people and I've got people putting an oxygen monitor on his finger. I'm setting up an albuterol breathing treatment. The doctor doesn't come in a lot. All sorts of other people were there and I thought what's going on? He said, well, he's having a hard time breathing. I'm like, yeah, that's why I brought him in. I knew something was wrong. They said we need you to drive around to the other side of the building and we're going to admit him to the hospital.

Speaker 2: 2:53

I was eight months pregnant. I had a really horrible pregnancy, got some heart issues. I was supposed to be home on strict bed rest. That meant getting up to go to the bathroom, getting up to shower. That was it. Couldn't find anybody to take me down to the pediatrician with him. Now I've got to drive around to the hospital. I call my husband and say he works an hour away. Something's going on.

Speaker 2: 3:12

They're admitting our son to the hospital and he's in a panic. He borrows a car. I get to the hospital and they're like honey, do you need a wheelchair? I'm like I've got to take him up to Peds. I get up to Peds and the respiratory therapist there and I'm like what is going on here? He said, oh, we're admitting him for asthma. I said uh-uh, no, I just talked to the pediatrician and he said he does not have asthma. And he said oh, he has asthma, right, that's why we are admitting him. So deer in the headlights look. Didn't know anything about asthma, didn't know terminology, didn't know how the disease worked, didn't know how it worked on different people. Just, absolutely in a panic, I am going into preterm labor at this point.

Speaker 2: 3:49

It was a really hard situation and, bless his heart, the respiratory therapist went over to his computer, printed off 30 pages worth of information from the Internet, came and flopped it down on my son's bedside table, turned on his heel and then just called over shoulder, call me if you get a diagnosis. You should get the information. This is back before smartphones. It wasn't like I could just pull up my phone and sit on the corner of his bed and Google what is asthma, what are the signs and symptoms? None of that was available. It was a really, really rocky road.

Speaker 2: 4:24

I dove into the world of asthma. I started reading those 30 pages worth of medical articles. I was circling, I was highlighting Respiratory therapists would come in. I said what does this mean? What's this work? Then we were introduced to an asthma specialist. The thing that can be really hard is that when my son was discharged the first time, the pediatrician said oh, he doesn't need to be on all those inhalers. You know there's steroids in them. That kind of stuff is good for the body. You need to stop all those, which I did what the doctor told me. My son was back in the hospital four weeks later with pneumonia again. So this time we decided to go with the asthma specialist and go with someone who knew what it was. This is his specialty. That can be a little bit hard sometimes.

Speaker 2: 5:05

When my son was first diagnosed, I had some hopeful family members that were into homeopathic medicine. They said you know what? We've got these drops. Just put them under his tongue and not fix anything. Starts having problems. Just use that. This is an older family member. She had six kids. I trusted her. My son ended up in the ICU. I said we're done here. I'm going to listen to the specialists and make sure that I'm following all the medical professionals. I'm not going to mess with essential oils or anything else. I've got to go with what works and what the guidelines are.

Speaker 2: 5:36

Through myself in the world of asthma, attending webinars, listening to anything I could read, anything I could. Then, when I would learn things from the doctor. I'd be sharing this with friends whose kids had asthma. A friend that worked in public health said you know, you are really good at this working with families and explaining things how they could understand. You should get a degree in public health. I said what is that? I found a program at the local university and she said you should go back and get a degree in this and you can get paid for what you're good at and helping families. So I did. It had been 19 years since I'd been in college. My oldest son was starting college the same time I was going to college. I was terrified. I had gone to college. We used typewriters and card catalogs and hear all these kids on their laptops whizzing around. It was terrifying. But made it through, earned my secondary bachelor's degree, had to take core classes, graduated with honors and then became certified nationally in public health and asthma.

Speaker 3: 6:31

You said it was the year 2000. If we wanted to try to find out anything, get on AOL and watch that dial-up happen. It's going to take forever to get into a chat room to talk to other parents. Right, I know that for me it was call my mom, my grandma, my aunt. Have you had to deal with this? What can you tell me? Right, with everything, did you feel at one point you're ready to fire your pediatrician?

Speaker 2: 6:54

I did. We stopped seeing him for asthma. We'd only go to the asthma specialist. I would take my kids back. The kids had strep throat or they broke their arm or something we would go to. The pediatrician made a firm boundary that the family member was not to talk to me about any homeopathic treatments at that point.

Speaker 2: 7:10

And they kept trying to do that with some of my heart problems and I said this is none of your business. I'm going to go to the doctors that are board certified and specialize in this. I'm going to make sure the information I get is accurate, because that almost cost my son his life, that is a valid point.

Speaker 3: 7:23

It's hard to want to weed out and listen on things and not others. People are overstepping when they think they're trying to be helpful. I see so many nodding heads.

Speaker 4: 7:32

I'm sure there's extreme situations that you have all dealt with. Listen, listen, it's Allie. Hello, I get a lot of DMs on Instagram about people who did not start their medication because of what we call in the studio world like medicine shamers, and we've all almost all of us have dealt with it. It's really hard, especially when we're getting diagnosed. I put off medication because I had medicine chambers in my life telling me that it's going to the first group I was in. The woman said it's going to kill me the medication because it killed her brother. Like I've had a lot of people like say, don't take that and I got joint damage because of it.

Speaker 4: 8:05

So I see a lot of people not start their medication because of the fear and I'm like, please just talk to your doctor, don't listen to random. I mean, yes, we want to listen to random strangers on the internet for, like, nice help, like you know, like all of us, what we're doing here, but when you, when you really need medical advice, you need to go to a doctor and voice your fears and not just listen to medicine shamers tell you don't do this because it's going to wreak havoc on your body. It's like if it were happening to you, I think you would have a different perspective, because that medicine shamer who had me like not want to take my meds and ended up happening to a family member of theirs and they were like, oh, they need medication. It's like, yeah, when it happens to someone close in your family, you'll understand. But yeah, so I'm very passionate about this.

Speaker 1: 8:45

So my thing in the inboxes is that this tea will cure cancer, pregnancy, genital warts. I was like how do you cure pregnancy? I always get stuck on that one. But how do you cure pregnancy? Then you want me to think that this is about to take away all of my autoimmune disease. You sprinkled in pregnancy with testicular cancer. This is a miracle tea. It's a no, you don't need those medications, but I do.

Speaker 2: 9:32

I don't want to hear about herbs. I don't want to hear about the juices, the latest tropical juice that's going to cure me. And so that's why I, specifically on my socials of my life as an asthma mom, I'll share stories about what we went through. I make sure that there's accurate information there. I will link to Mayo Clinic or one of the other allergy and American Lung Association or some of the national, because I want to make sure that they know that the information I'm giving is accurate, because it can be really dangerous. And why shame somebody? You are not in their shoes and you do not know what they're going through. And I've had so many people say I just I don't have to take medicine for the rest of my life. I'm like, why not? I intend to live a long life and annoy my kids. They're all adults now. I want to annoy them for several more decades. I want to live a long life and if this can help me do that, I'm going to take it, yeah, and let's be realistic.

Speaker 3: 10:23

We owe those kids, yeah, everything that they've put us through in our lives. We owe them to be around. Have you ever seen those videos of the parents acting like the child going through their house? Yes, messing up all the dishes?

Speaker 2: 10:38

Yeah, I want to be that parent Flipping the lights on, leaving the cupboard doors open, setting cream on the counter, letting it melt all that, yeah, yeah. If we made it through teenage years with our kids, we deserve a medal.

Speaker 1: 10:48

Andrea. I was diagnosed with asthma in the 80s. Okay, I had the pediatrician that had never asthma, because it was so apparently uncommon in the 80s. What are some of the misconceptions about asthma that you encounter in your field? Because when I was getting my diagnosis they had my mom thinking I had cystic fibrosis and they were holding me over beds and beating my back and chest and doing all of the stuff. All I really needed to do was get the mucus out my lungs because I had asthma and a good old nebulizer treatment would have cleared that up. But you know.

Speaker 2: 11:19

A lot of people say oh, it's just asthma, just use your inhaler. That's not good enough sometimes. Sometimes you need a nebulizer. Sometimes people need a daily controller anti-inflammatory, which is what I need, and then I also need to have a dual inhaler. That also is the long acting version of albuterol. So there's different types of asthma. It depends really on your body. Just like all of us look different on the screen, asthma can look different for everybody. It depends on what type of phenotype and endotype of asthma you have.

Speaker 2: 11:47

Some of the biggest myths are that asthma is just a childhood disease. Well, guess what? They grow up to be adults and they still have asthma. And asthma does not go away. And I said well, I'm a little 60. How old do you have to be before you outgrow asthma? And that's a really common one.

Speaker 2: 12:01

That people say is that people outgrow it. No, we just grow up and our lungs grow with us and we may have less symptoms because we're better at preventing germs I'm a germaphobe, where it could be better at preventing ways of getting sick. That's a big one. You have to say, oh, it's just anxiety, it's all in your head, you just take some deep breaths and you'll just be fighting. No, it's actually in my lungs, but thanks for that. Another one is people with asthma shouldn't do sports. They need to just be on the chess club in school. Well, no, we want your heart strong, we want your lungs strong. And if you look at the Olympic athletes, the most common disease among athletes Olympic athletes is asthma, if they're competing at that they're competing at that global level at the highest amount of their sport.

Speaker 2: 12:48

Well, I can go for a walk around the block or I can go for a bike ride. All my kids do sports and if you have exercise-induced asthma, sometimes your doctor will have you pre-medicate, they'll have you use your albuterol inhaler, say, 20 minutes beforehand, and so there's a lot you can do. But absolutely, sports are good. Some people say, hey, I don't want to use my inhalers because they're addictive and I'll never be able to get off it and they're going to stop working over time. My body's going to build up a defense. Also, not true. We talk about the inhaled corticosteroids that a lot of people use to control their asthma. Think of it as an anti-inflammatory. It's keeping that swelling down in your lungs and that's the number one thing people don't understand about asthma. Asthma, it is disease of inflammation. Your lungs swell and every time they swell they're going to build up scar tissue. People that are not treating their asthma over time can actually go on to develop COPD. So if you imagine you're injuring the same place on your body you got that covered door that sticks out, or that part on your island, you come around the corner, you're always hitting your hip on it. Well, after a while you're going to build up scar tissue there because that's a repeated assault on the body. That's what happens with asthma. So really preventing that from happening and keeping that swelling down in your lung, it can lower the amount of asthma attacks you're having. It can help keep you out of the hospital. That's an important one. They're not addictive. They don't stop working.

Speaker 2: 14:13

Another one is people say what? I'm not hearing any wheezing. Oh well, you can't be having an asthma flare because you're not wheezing. We don't all wheeze. I can't wheeze to save my life, my daughter, I the room. So if I end up in the ER, which we get the California fires all the time, we get smoke from them all the time. In my state ended back up in the ER and then they're just like you know, you're not wheezing. I couldn't even speak. So I had to have my husband say you know what. She really knows what she's talking about. She's certified in asthma. She doesn't wheeze. She never has wheeze. I have cough variant asthma, so you can't always look for that. That's another one of those myths that oh, they're not wheezing so it's got to be something else. Those are some misconceptions about asthma. I would say I'm in the Rocky Mountains in Salt Lake City, utah, right outside all the beautiful ski resorts. It's a gorgeous place. We have really horrible air quality right now.

Speaker 1: 15:04

It's notoriously bad in.

Speaker 2: 15:06

January. In fact, I believe it's either a red or orange air quality day. Right now it's yellow, the health warning's yellow, and that's from the fires in LA. This is from our inversions. So how do you plan your day-to-day?

Speaker 2: 15:24

I had two grown kids that moved back home. If they want to go out, they go to the gym, they go to the local rec center to run and do all that type of stuff. We really don't go out. We make sure that we always have the recirculating air set on the cars when we go out.

Speaker 2: 15:39

When the air quality is really bad like this, we also make sure that we're changing the air filter, the cabin filter for the car. So most people think, oh, you mean the cabin filter on the oil? No, no, no, it isn't the air filter on the engine. There's an air filter right behind the glove box and it filters the air that comes into the car. So that needs to be changed very frequently too if you're driving around a lot with this inversion.

Speaker 2: 15:59

So sometimes they don't allow the kids to go out to recess on really bad inversion days because it can be that dangerous for them. Little kids breathe faster, they have a faster respiratory rate, they're outside more than adults, so they can really have a lot of lung problems from this. They're outside a lot, so that's just part of where we live. We live at the bottom of a bowl and all the air pollution is trapped and we have that inversion. If you go up above that, you go up to Park City and go up to some of the ski resorts, it's crystal clear and blue, beautiful skies, and then you come down into this smog and this gunk.

Speaker 3: 16:32

Congratulations on winning the Asthma Home Visit Program. You won in 2022 the EPA the Environmental Leadership and Asthma Management Award. Can you tell us more about the program and its impact on families?

Speaker 2: 16:48

Yes, it was our statewide program. I ran the program in my county. I have about 750,000 people and we cover about 2,400 square miles. I did all that driving around and visit people. Our program was grant funded from the state health department. It's the funding from the CDC. It doesn't cost people anything, because it was only me for 750,000 people.

Speaker 2: 17:10

I could only help the people that had the most severe asthma or uncontrolled asthma. So we would get referrals from the hospital, from emergency rooms, from pediatricians, and we would help those people. And one thing I know, going back 25 years ago when my son was diagnosed, is you're just a deer in the headlight in the hospital when you get a diagnosis. You don't know up from down, and so when these people are discharged and they're in their home and they're comfortable because they're in their familiar surroundings, it's easier for them to learn and to remember what you're telling them. So these home visit programs are really important and they may hear a tenth of what the doctor told them with the pediatrician or whoever they're going to go see. So what we would do is we would go into the home and I would also offer visits after hours because they don't want people to miss work, because when you have asthma and you're taking a lot of sick days, I don't want anybody their job to be in jeopardy because I had them meet me there for two hours at their house. I would also offer to come after hours or, on a Saturday, go into their home and we would teach them basics.

Speaker 2: 18:13

Asthma symptoms, emergency symptoms, say. Here's what normally happens during an asthma check. However, if these things start happening, this is when I need to go to the emergency room. We would talk about asthma triggers. What are some of those things that are going to set off your asthma, and people just didn't realize how the environment, things around them, could affect their asthma. We would talk to them about different types of inhalers. So, okay, let's put a sticker on this one. This is one you're going to take every day. I'm going to put a little sticker on the back that has a calendar, so that reminds you that you're going to take that every morning and every night, like your doctor's asked you to this one over here years.

Speaker 2: 18:44

When you're having a little bit of that little tickle in the straw, you start coughing, you can use that inhaler and have a little sticker of that of a little kid coughing, because most people really mix up their inhalers, which one they use. And then there's different types of inhaler. There's dry powder inhalers, meter dose inhalers and soft mist inhalers. All three of those are going to be taken differently. So go through all those and I have them. Show me Now. Just show me. Pretend I'm not here. Then you're just going to use your inhaler for the day. Show me how you would normally use that. Remember I'm over here and I would show them a video with proper inhaler technique and I'd say okay, now tell me if you notice anything different on this video or anything else you do differently. If they couldn't remember or didn't notice, then I would pick it out.

Speaker 2: 19:24

Okay, just remember you got to shake that first, because it's like an aerosol. Make sure you shake that first, or make sure you breathe out all the way first, then bring the inhaler over. So, whatever it is, we would correct their inhaler technique. Then we'd have them teach it back to us. No-transcript. Outside of the pool noodle and then there's a little bit of saran wrap in the middle. I said, okay, now try breathing through that. That's what we have to try to breathe through when we're having an asthma attack or an asthma flare. Look at this big piece of this paper towel tube. Look how big that is in the middle, nothing causing problems. You can breathe right through that. I would always say, if you remember nothing else about today, you do not want to be a pool noodle, and they would laugh, but it would help them remember. Yeah, I got to keep that slowing down in my lungs. So we do that on the first visit. The second visit we come back and we teach them how to make their house allergy and asthma friendly In cleaning supplies. I would write another grant to be able to get cleaning supplies for them and actually teach them how to clean. You would think that people know how to clean their house, but you got to do things a little bit differently with allergies and asthma, to make sure that you're getting rid of dust, you're getting rid of mold and some things that wouldn't maybe bother some of the other people, helping them feel like, instead of being a victim of that disease, that they, hey, you know what. I can do something to make sure that I'm not having so many bad days and I'm not ending up in the emergency room.

Speaker 2: 21:01

The stats for this and this is one of the reasons we won the award we reduced people that ended up in the hospital that participated in our program. We reduced that by 87% yes, 87. Visits to the ER decreased by 75%. People taking prednisone, as we like to call it, satan's little tic-tacs, because you get a little crazy when you're on it. We were able to cut that in half for the people participating in our program. People missing remember I talked about missing work days we decreased that 80%. And kids missing school we decreased that by 51%. So really we're helping these people have a better quality of life.

Speaker 2: 21:39

They don't have all these medical bills. I think it was for every $1 that we would spend in the program going out and visit them, we were saving. I believe it was $3 in medical costs to the insurance companies. These programs are all over the country. A lot of the public health departments have them. Some hospitals even have these asthma home visit programs, if you're interested. I know a lot of people go oh honey, I have had asthma all these years. I got to teach you a thing or two, and usually they don't know as much as they think they do or they're missing things, and so really these programs are fantastic. I can't rave about them enough. So check and see if there's one in your area that is so helpful.

Speaker 3: 22:17

I think a lot of people this would never even occur to me about if I'm cleaning my house well enough or properly enough. Am I forgetting something? I've got cats, so of course I'm hypersensitive to. When I'm having guests I have to warn them about my cats. But I have a friend that comes to visit and she's allergic. So this room is off, it's quarantined. There's things we don't think about, like curtains, window blinds Huh, what do you?

Speaker 2: 22:39

recommend. I have been looking at right now at my bay window at these beautiful plantation shutters. They're the worst for asthma. I don't know about all of you, but that is not on my list of to-do things. By the end of the day I am too tired, but I'm not sleeping under these. So it's okay If you have something like that over your bed or those two-inch wood blinds.

Speaker 2: 22:58

The horizontal areas are going to trap dust, making sure that you're cleaning those a lot or switching to something else. What we did in my daughter's room because she was extra sensitive to dust is we had just the Roman shades. They would just roll up during the day. It's that vertical surface. None of the dust will stick to it. And then we'd roll it down and we had little shears underneath that. I made sure that all the curtains we can have washed. My in-laws had a vacation home and you know how they would nail those curtains up to the wall. Those had not been washed in 30 years.

Speaker 2: 23:27

So make sure you're washing your curtains, cleaning the blinds, your vacuum at least once a week with a HEPA vacuum and make sure that you are vacuuming under the beds. Everybody forgets that, but our asthma specialist did not let us store anything under the beds, because think about the last time you actually gave a good cleaning under your bed. Usually when you move, which for me is like every 13 years or something like that If you are short on storage and you do need to put things under the bed, they do make really low, narrow bins that you can get you can slide underneath. Make sure when you're vacuuming every single week, pull those out, vacuum underneath it, wipe off the top of that lid with the microfiber cloth and make sure you're keeping that dust down In bathrooms. Make sure that you're running the exhaust fan the entire time you're showering and an additional 15 minutes and that's really going to pull that moisture out of that room.

Speaker 2: 24:14

Another thing to look for I love interior design shows, obviously, because that's my jam. I see this fantastic how they're tiling the bathrooms. Well, 10 years, 15 years down the road, you're going to have cracked grout. You're going to have missing grout, you're going to have missing grout and that can cause black mold to grow all behind your wall. Ask me how. I know Happened in my last house. Sometimes a shower surround might be a better option. They've changed over the years. They used to be really ugly when I was younger. Now they make them. I have one upstairs and it looks like white subway tile. You can get them, so they look like good marble, not like the kind of marble that they used to make.

Speaker 2: 24:48

So water intrusion is really a problem for a lot of people and I don't know if you've ever heard of water meters or little water alarms. You can get inexpensive water alarms from the hardware store. You can put those by your water heater. When those go out, those go out and you've got 50 gallons flooding your basement, which we also had happen. You can put them behind your washing machine if it leaks. You can put them by toilets if they leak. They have some that are really inexpensive and they will do a really high decibel sound that will wake up the entire neighborhood, or they even have versions you can connect to your phones While you're traveling on vacation.

Speaker 2: 25:23

It can alert you. If you're at work, you're traveling, it will let you know that something's leaking. So there's a lot of prevention that goes on with that we talk about. You don't want little critters in your house, so making sure that you take away their food and water source is really important. Washing the dishes before you're going to bed, wiping down the countertops, getting those teenagers or college kids, whoever's at home, making sure that you're using chip clips, making sure that things are stored in Tupperware containers. Take that trash out. You don't want that smell, bringing in the mice and roaches and that type of thing. I could go on forever.

Speaker 3: 25:55

Managing asthma as a family can be challenging, but what advice would you give to parents that are raising children with asthma and allergies?

Speaker 2: 26:04

You know, this is a lifelong disease and this is not going to be a sprint, this is going to be a marathon. Trying to involve the family members. When one of my kids would be in the hospital, we'd go down and every Friday night we had pizza and movie night. Well, we'd go to the hospital and have pizza and movie night and then we would have the other kids help out. Hey, can you go grab the nebulizer for me? Can you grab a vial of albuterol? Can you go get the oximeter? We need to stick that on his finger. So getting everybody involved, because I wasn't always going to be there and everybody needs to know how to respond in an emergency if someone was in trouble.

Speaker 2: 26:37

There was a time I was out sitting up for a garden party in my backyard. I don't know what set me off. I was coughing so hard and, andy, I don't know if you've ever done this, where you're coughing so hard, you're trying to throw up, you've got a really bad asthma attack. I came into the house and I was just shaking and I was trying to get the nebulizer. My son just swooped in behind me, grabbed the nebulizer, put the outbeater on, put the kit together, put it on, turned it on and handed it to me, and I needed that right then because I was doubled over on my knees trying not to throw up. So having everybody in the family know how to help with whatever disease it is If it's with diabetes, have them know how to check your blood sugar and how to be able to give you your insulin. If it's with any other disease, whatever that is, everybody in the family needs to know how to treat that and let everybody know.

Speaker 2: 27:20

Sorry, I haven't spent that much time with you this week. You know, maybe we can go out to lunch on the weekend or something, because other kids are going to get left out when one kid's in the hospital. That can be a problem. And then don't be afraid to ask for help. If you need somebody to help take your carpool shift, if you need somebody to run your kids to soccer, if you need people to bring in meals when people are like, oh, if there's anything I can do, just let me know. I could really use a meal. Tonight. I haven't gone to the grocery store. I am so tired of starting a migraine, whatever it is. You know people do want to help, so give them something concrete to do, and then we use a lot of humor in our family. So we're, yeah, we're always. And I know, jenny, you love Aladdin, so we'll quote lines from Disney movies, and with the one with the little penguins I just forgot the name of it where they with Alex the lion, madagascar thank you.

Speaker 2: 28:17

The penguins when they get to the wrong place they go. Well, this sucks. You know my daughter would quote that. We'd quote other movies. Try to have some fun with it, because you're either going to laugh or cry.

Speaker 3: 28:26

But you know laughing doesn't give me a headache when it comes to things like toys around the house. Do you need to wash them often? Do you need to limit? How often Do you need to limit how many are around?

Speaker 2: 28:38

Yeah, yes, that's what we would tell people. Make sure that you're washing the bedding on your bed once a week, everything on the bed. And for most people I would say, when was the last time you washed your bedding? And people would say, I don't know. If you can't remember, go wash it. If you're listening to this podcast, put your laundry in if you can't remember. And then we would always set a day of the week. We've got a house full of kids when they were younger, so everybody would have a day of the week. So every Friday my husband worked 410. So Friday morning you'd go pop the laundry in. So once a week is best practice for washing your bedding. Obviously, dry it. I don't know if people are living in different climates. Really, drying it outside and hanging it on the clothesline is the worst possible thing you could do. If you have allergies, that pollen is going to stick to that wet fabrics. If you can use a dryer, that's really the best thing to do.

Speaker 2: 29:21

And then we would limit the stuffed animals for our kids. Grandma would always give them something for their birthday and Christmas and any other reason, because they were so cute. We'd limit it. We'd say, okay, well, you can put two of your favorite stuffies on your bed. The rest were in a bin covered up with the lid on. Then about once a month we'd also wash and dry the stuffed animals too. Sometimes that can affect the fur. Sometimes you can put them in a lingerie bag or a pillowcase and then pin that over the top and put safety pins all along the top of it, and then it doesn't get as much agitation, but making sure that that room is really clean. Also, you can use air cleaners in the rooms. We swear by air cleaners. We have them in each of the bedrooms, so that can really help too. But yeah, good question about the stuffed animals. Those are a magnet for dust.

Speaker 3: 30:29

This is helpful because, even though I don't have asthma, we all have company over at some point and you want to make sure that you are thinking ahead and being respectful for guests.

Speaker 2: 30:37

That's what you can do in your living room. If you have a vacuum if you have a canister vacuum or regular vacuum with the attachment on it you can vacuum off the couch, because cat hair sticks to everything we all know that. Or you can use a lint roller. There are some sprays out there that are low odor, that are allergy and asthma friendly, that reduce allergen. You can give the couch a quick spritz or the carpet, turn on the ceiling fan, make sure all that airs out before your guest gets there, and a lot of things that I would do.

Speaker 2: 31:09

If I would go to a house for an asthma home visit and I would pull up to the house and the yard was just a mess, I knew the inside was going to look that way too, I would just pre-medicate. I'd use my albuterol before I'd go in. If I go to a friend's house that has dogs, I'm also allergic to dogs, so I just use my nail art before I go. I'm just knowing. You know I may need to use it again when I get in there, but there's things we can do to kind of preempt it for us as well.

Speaker 3: 31:27

And things like ceiling fans too. Make sure you're cleaning the dust off of those. Those get nasty.

Speaker 2: 31:32

I actually created a graphic for that on my socials of things that people might not think about. So and think your computer screen here. It just sucks that, dust your. So and think your computer screen here it just sucks that. Dust your big screen TV. Make sure that you're using something. I grew up using the feather dusters. Those things were useless. Now they have dusters that the dust will actually stick to, so being able to go all throughout the house and we do, we do the fans do. On top of. Well, if people are still using VCRs or DVD players, or maybe your router TV screens, anything like that, make sure you're dusting all of that as well. Good suggestion.

Speaker 3: 32:05

Get it off, don't just move it around. Exactly Now, you've also been involved in asthma education at the global level. How do approaches to asthma management differ across cultures, and what lessons have you learned from working internationally?

Speaker 2: 32:21

A lot of the asthma inhalers can have different names in different countries. I can't say, for instance, I need to use my reliever inhaler here, it's albuterol. Here in the US, well, in the UK it's salbuterol. So there's going to be different names. We can't go by names because every country is going to call things differently. We need to just say the anti-inflammatory or the one that you're going to take every morning and every night, and then this one is when you're having symptoms. You can go ahead and take it.

Speaker 2: 32:49

I think that's important in offering resources in the countries where they live. So not everybody lives in the US that goes through my socials or follows my blog or anything like that. I'll share resources from Australia or England or something from India, and so making sure they have resources in their country and then knowing that things that I may share in the US may not apply to other countries because our healthcare system is different. We may pay significantly more for inhalers here than they do in other countries, and I know Congress had addressed that, and three out of the four inhaler companies have actually lowered their co-pays to $35. One did not. My inhaler is one of those that's still quite expensive. I have to not only use insurance, but then I have to download a coupon and use a coupon every year to be able to get that extra $50 off. I think that things are going to be different in all the different countries and you're right when it comes to different customs and things in different countries. So for some cultures having a chihuahua, they believe that that will absorb all of the diseases in the home. But then it's also an asthma trigger if they have asthma and are allergic to dogs. So how do you approach that?

Speaker 2: 33:54

I would never tell people to get rid of their pets. I was on an asthma home visit and went into a home and a woman said if you're going to tell me to get rid of my dog, you can just turn around and walk right back out that door. And I said oh no, I'm not one of those kind of people, don't worry. But is there a way that they can still have their pet but maybe have a pet-free room for the child to sleep in at night? Maybe the dog isn't allowed in the bedroom and maybe the door stays closed and the showers? Before they go to bed to get all the dander off, them climb into those nice clean sheets that they just washed. At the week mark. They have their air cleaner in there, so maybe can they have one safe room that the pet's not allowed in. So you have to be a little bit delicate with different people and the needs that they have.

Speaker 3: 34:33

What resources or programs would you recommend to families that are seeking to better understand and manage asthma?

Speaker 2: 34:40

I would go. There's three patient organizations that are sort of rivals here in the US, but there's three that are really good and make sure that they have patient-friendly information, low literacy level for graphics, seminars, some of the summits all that's free, so kind of. The three big is American Lung Association. They've been around for what I think over a hundred years or something. They have all sorts of videos. They have an asthma basics or an asthma 101. There's another one, asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, afa, and then the third one is Allergy and Asthma Network. There are the professional organizations, but a lot of times that information is a lot higher literacy level and a little bit harder for people to understand. But these three seem to focus more on basic webinars for people to understand throughout the year. So those are some good options, fantastic, thank you.

Speaker 1: 35:26

First I want to say how confusing this interview has been because we have the same name. Every time you say her name, I'm like huh, you know where I'm from, but you weren't talking to me. It has been throwing me off. I'm not being passive or inattentive. I'm trying not to respond to hearing my name, but I do have a question, because we feel like we lose things when we're told that we can't have the smell good stuff and the candles and the perfumes and the fragrances. What would you tell someone who'd be diagnosed that they have to when they have to give these things up? What are alternatives for them to still have a little fun and not die of, you know, suffocation from having the asthma?

Speaker 2: 36:05

You know, and it could be something as simple as trying a different perfume, because I, Andy, I don't know about you, but patchouli oil is the worst for me. It will trigger an asthma attack every time. Every time I fly, somebody is on the plane with patchouli oil. I fly with an N95 mask because when I get COVID I'm on oxygen for six months all day long, so I'm trying to avoid that. I can even taste it through the mask, so I'll premedicate. Same thing I'll premedicate before I get on the plane.

Speaker 2: 36:32

If somebody you know that's their go-to and if that's triggering an asthma attack for them or family members, is there a different type of perfume that they could try? A different type of perfume that they could try? I had a really awkward conversation where I had to ask the secretary at the health department where I work not to wear her patchouli oil because I could smell it out in the hall before I even got to the office. So is there a different type of perfume that they can try? With the house being a little bit stuffy, you can actually switch on the fan so it circulates the air through your house on a regular basis. It increases those air exchanges that can help have a little teeny, tiny candle right here. I'll turn it on for maybe 10, 15 minutes, that's it, and then it's off. And it's not a strong scent, it's just vanilla.

Speaker 2: 37:11

You can treat yourselves every once in a while, but it's going to be trial and error. If you're trying something that's giving asthma attack, think maybe I should use a different scent. I had one in the fall. There was something that was pumpkin, way too spicy. Threw that one away. I can just do vanilla and it gives me a little bit of a scent. So we're not here to kill all their fun. We're here to say, oh, we'll try something else in that area that might be a little bit safer for you.

Speaker 5: 37:35

My son has asthma and we lived in Kansas. We moved here to Arizona when he was in second grade. We lived in Kansas, we moved here to Arizona when he was in second grade and we noticed, just switching location, his asthma started going away, but it didn't go away.

Speaker 5: 37:52

He just wasn't around all those allergens in the Midwest. He is now starting to develop his asthma again. It's almost like his body adjusted. So he's having to learn more about his asthma as an adult, because he's 25 and he hasn't really dealt with it since he was in elementary. Do you have any tips or suggestions I could share with him? We made him get rid of his cat. He had a cat and we thought maybe that has helped. But do you have any other tips you could share with somebody that is now dealing with it as an adult? That's?

Speaker 2: 38:33

not uncommon at all. I remember asking my specialist I need to move. There's somewhere I can move that will be safer. He said it doesn't matter where you live. You will develop new allergies to wherever you're living. You're going to become allergic to new bushes, new trees. So does he have allergies as well as asthma?

Speaker 5: 38:49

Yes, he does. He has seasonal allergies. Yes, Okay.

Speaker 2: 38:54

So the biggest thing about asthma is he has the allergic type asthma. It's really controlling your allergies, because that's going to control your asthma. So first thing that's going to start is in the spring it's trees. People don't realize that trees have pollen. Trees are going to be your enemy in the spring, Summer is grass and in the fall is ragweed. So one of the best things you can do and I know Arizona gets raging hot like we do, and sometimes you get that- nice little breeze.

Speaker 5: 39:20

We're actually in central Arizona. We're kind of mild four seasons. He's moving soon where there is no grass. I'm hoping that might make a difference this summer for him.

Speaker 2: 39:33

And the thing is pollen can travel, so ragweed's the worst. They've found it thousands of miles out to sea. He may not. Depending on where he lives, he's probably never going to find a safe space. One of the best things he can do is shower before he goes to bed every night. That's going to remove all that pollen from his hair. Keep the windows closed. I don't care if there's a nice breeze coming in. Okay, does he have an air cleaner in his room?

Speaker 5: 39:56

No, but that might be a Valentine's present for him.

Speaker 2: 40:01

There you go. The other other thing is is he on allergy medicine?

Speaker 5: 40:04

yes, just okay. They told him to take over the counter. But when it flares up, his asthma does kick in really bad when he gets any type of a chest cold and that's how it all started was he had rsv as a. He was about a year and a half and and that's when the asthma started, but it got worse as the season changed in Kansas.

Speaker 2: 40:26

And now it's starting back up, and that's the thing is what we talked about asthma being a disease of inflammation is making sure that he's on the right medicine for his body and for his type of asthma. So does he take a daily controller inhaler right now?

Speaker 5: 40:40

Yes, and I couldn't tell you the name, because he buys it and he doesn't live with us anymore, but he has a rescue one, and a daily one, okay, sometimes people aren't great about taking a daily inhaler because you woke up late, you're late for work.

Speaker 2: 40:56

And when we started our asthma home visit program, it was set up to say how many days a week are you taking your inhaler? I'm like no, no, no, no, that's not going to cut it, because I heard a doctor at an asthma conference and he said the best way to say is about how many days a week do you remember to take it? Because most people only take their inhaler two or three days a week and they'll say, well, I take mine four days a week. Then you have the real number, because they're not telling you seven to please you. You're getting to what's really going on. There are some people say what's the barrier and what's going on there? Can they afford the controller inhaler they need to take every morning and night? Do they need to pair it with another activity? Are they brushing their teeth every morning and every night?

Speaker 5: 41:31

Let's hope, because sometimes guys can be guys.

Speaker 2: 41:35

Can you put it near his toothbrush? There have been some teenagers. And what do you do every morning? Well, I go to school. What do you do before you go to school? I put my sneakers on. They put their inhaler in their sneakers, so they can't go to school until they use their inhalers.

Speaker 2: 41:46

It's pairing it with another activity and it's helping him understand why my thing is I want to do that. Well, why? Why do I have to take this? So, once I understood that that's keeping that swelling down down in the lungs Remember that pool noodle. If you're a pool noodle and you get a cold on top of that, or you get COVID on top of that, or the flu or anything else, you're going to end up in the ER, you're going to end up in the hospital and you're going to be sick for a long time. It takes a long time, once that swelling's there, to get that swelling down in the lungs, because the lungs do not like to be bothered. So preventing that from happening in the first place can be really helpful. They helpful, they did come out with that.

Speaker 2: 42:19

There's a new treatment they use. Oh, there's new guidelines that they use and it's called um smart therapy and you use the same inhaler as your reliever inhaler as you do as your controller inhaler. Some people are like, look, I'm not going to use it every day, I'm not going to remember I got stuff going on in my life. It's just too much so for him. Instead of um, this inhaler that I have is just albuterol there. There's a newer one which I can't get to right now because it's upstairs. It's a combination of albuterol and it has that little anti-inflammatory in it. So if he's having asthma attacks during the week and this new medication has been out just over a year it was available forever in Europe and it's called Air Supra, it's all one word. So it has albuterol in it and it has a little bit of the anti-inflammatory as well. So every time if he's having a flare-up and he's going to use his albuterol, he's going to get a little kick of that anti-inflammatory.

Speaker 2: 43:07

There's two controller inhalers on the market that you can use every day and then you can also use when you're having an asthma attack, and that's Dulera and Simbacort. Both of them have a medicine in called F motor all. If you look at graphs of how albuterol works and how from motor all works, they're identical. It works just as fast as albuterol, but it lasts longer. So those two medications, studies have shown um I'm not all throughout the world and here in the us that people can use those if they don't want to use it. Say, he remembers to take his simbacort or his dual air twice a week. Then he can use the same one for his reliever inhaler, because some people don't like carrying around two inhalers.

Speaker 5: 43:44

That might be a barrier that he's dealing with, but I like the noodle example, because I think he will understand that a little better.

Speaker 2: 43:55

He's a boy, you know, and a lot of times I have two boys and a girl. How like I have two boys and a girl. How kids are, let's see how old are they? 30 at 25, and you know they don't like to be different. So this, these are what I would use. Okay, if you can see those there. So this is a paper towel tube. I just put craft paper around the outside to mimic the color of the pool little.

Speaker 2: 44:16

You go to the dollar store and get those latex rubber bands. You could see this how the bands are just pulling in around that when you have an asthma attack. These bands, they're smooth muscles and they tighten and they shorten and they just squeeze from the outside. You got all that swelling going on from the inside. Look at that versus the pool noodle. Let me flip them around and then what little room is left? There's my little saran wrap. So try breathing through that versus this. So try breathing through that versus this. So having them just understand.

Speaker 2: 44:44

You know you're going to have a better quality of life if you can really prevent having problems in the first place going on with the lungs. I mean, most people don't want to hear that. You know, 20 years down the road they're going to be on oxygen because they did control their asthma and it transitioned to COPD. They don't care. That's far down the road. They don't care.

Speaker 2: 44:57

But you can ask them is there anything that you can do now that you want to do that you feel like you can't do because of asthma? He might say, well, I can't play basketball with my buddies because I'm really short of breath or you know, whatever it is he likes to do, and you can say you know, humor me what would happen if you tried using your inhaler, say like every day for two weeks, like morning and night, like the doctor wanted you to, just curious to see if you feel like you don't have to use your reliever inhaler as much, if you can keep up with your buddies in basketball or skateboarding, whatever he likes to do. So sometimes, if you phrase it that way, like fine, I'll try it. You know that I follow up with them in two weeks they're like I didn't use my inhaler in two weeks. That never happens Sometimes you can try and approach something like that, thank you so much.

Speaker 5: 45:43

Those were great tips to help him. As adults, they think they're an adult, but I love the examples, so I appreciate it. Thank you, you're welcome. I understand.

Speaker 4: 45:49

I love having like a physical object to explain it and it kind of like helps people see it. So like how we were talking about medicine shamers. If you had that to show a medicine shamer, they would be like oh right, yeah, Okay, they're going to need medication to help with inflammation. I wish I had a pool noodle and something to explain what my joint is like.

Speaker 2: 46:06

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 46:07

Because, I have rheumatoid arthritis.

Speaker 4: 46:08

Those who are like do you need medication Because it's an invisible illness and so it's visible.

Speaker 2: 46:13

We can't see it To have something physical helps the professional model, and this one shows what happens. But most people are like what even is that? So I've come up as a designer being creative. Let's come up with something a little bit more creative. So this they understand. I would go to the dollar store every spring and I would buy these out of pocket, pay with it for my own money. I would make sets of these for all of our school nurses. In other places they're employed by the schools, but they were employed by the health departments. Give them a set of these every year. You always have a whole bunch of new nurses. I put a little flyer in there about the asthma home visit program. I'm like. These are latex-free. You can teach students about what happens and why it's important for them to use their inhaler. This costs almost nothing.

Speaker 3: 47:06

But yes, I wish we had something for could think of a physical way to show people what it is that we're all feeling, even though they can't see it.

Speaker 2: 47:12

Yeah, hope you can come up with something. I'll have to think that would be really interesting to show what happens with RA.

Speaker 3: 47:17

I appreciate your time so much. This was so helpful, thank you.

Speaker 2: 47:22

Thank you everyone. I hope this helps people that are listening. You can live a good quality of life with asthma. Just get on the right medication for your body, for your type of asthma. If you don't like the inhaler, go back to your doctor. There's a whole rainbow of options of inhalers on the market. If you don't like your using, go back and say is there something else? I just don't like this one. There's injectables that they use now to control asthma. There's a lot out there. Don't give up. Keep trying until you find something that works for you and works for your body.

Speaker 4: 47:48

And thank you all, for all you do because you're helping so many people.

Speaker 3: 47:52

All right, everyone. Until next time. Don't forget your spoon.