Flash-back Friday - know asthma terminology
If there's one thing I've learned over the past 10 years, it's to know asthma terminology. It helps when I am at the ER to be able to say, "He's he asthma, his peak flow is usually 350 -but right now it's 200." Knowing your kid's peak flow gives them a concrete number, rather than just saying "he's having a hard time breathing". We're also lucky enough to be able to use a friend's oxygen saturation monitor. So I can also say, "their oxygen level is reading at 89 on my sat monitor" (you should be be closer to 100). They usually admit my kids to the hospital if their oxygen level is at 89 or lower. I tell them not to bother looking for retraction , because my son suffers from air trapping and experiences the 'barrel chest'. Retraction is when they are trying so hard to breath that they use all their accessory muscles, usually sucking in the skin surrounding the chest when they breath. You can usually...