Can’t seem to get rid of your vaping habit? The best way to begin the process is to analyze how it first started. There are many reasons why people begin using e-cigarettes: to stop smoking, to fit in with their peers at school or just to try it. Teens are more likely to start to …
As a lung doc, the biggest health threat we talk about is tobacco. Like Paul Simon’s old song, “50 ways to kill your lover,” tobacco wreaks havoc on almost every organ system in one way or another. Nicotine addiction drives the desire to smoke, chew or snuff, and can be a difficult addiction to break. …
Inhale this: Why vaping is destroying your lungs Read More »
From coughing and a sore throat, to fever, to sinus and nasal congestion, and even wheezing, respiratory symptoms can leave you feeling miserable. Potential causes include allergies, sinus infection, throat infection and pneumonia, but one of the most common causes is acute bronchitis. (The word “acute” means the symptoms came on suddenly rather than being …
More than 26 million Americans are all too familiar with the feeling of “breathing through a straw” — or in other words, an asthma attack. A patient of mine named Scott described it this way after being diagnosed with adult-onset asthma: “Breathing is one of many things we take for granted. It’s something we don’t …
How to take control of your asthma with the “Rules of Two” paradigm Read More »
Having asthma is like breathing through a straw. Those words stare at me every day like a billboard. That’s how Mark Millard, MD, pulmonologist on the medical staff at the Baylor Scott & White Martha Foster Lung Care Center, first described asthma to me. Before you get the wrong idea, I’m not a pre-teen. I …
Breathing through a straw: Life with adult-onset asthma Read More »
Take a breath, hold it in your lungs and count to three. Now exhale, but don’t let out all the air. Now take in another breath and hold it, let a little out, and inhale once more. Imagine: Could you go grocery shopping while breathing like this? This is how an estimated 30 million people …
COPD patients use harmonicas to increase lung capacity Read More »
When you think about asthma, what comes to mind? Maybe it’s an image of your child coughing after exposure to pollen, or maybe it’s a kid running around on the soccer field that starts wheezing. We usually do not think of adults as having asthma, and for good reason — adult-onset asthma does not usually …
Fortunately, in the United States, smoking is decreasing over the last decade. As a surgeon who treats lung cancer, this makes me very happy. However, a new trend has developed over recent years with the use of electronic cigarettes or vaping. Vaping or e-cigarettes is inhalation of a vaporized substance typically containing nicotine that is …
Every time you take a breath, it kick-starts a complex series of events that brings oxygen from the air into the blood that circulates through your entire body. It’s a fascinating process that can sometimes hit speed bumps. “At least 40 million Americans are currently diagnosed with a chronic lung condition,” said Mark Millard, MD, …