8 Common Respiratory

Diseases
1. Asthma

 This chronic respiratory condition is caused by

consistent inflammation of the airways.

 Symptoms are lung spasms with wheezing and

shortness of breath.

 Things like allergies, infections, and pollution can

ignite an asthma attack.

 Around 25 million people suffer from asthma and 7

million of which are children.

 Asthma often begins during childhood.

 Symptoms that are left untreated can worsen and,

in some cases, be fatal.

 While there is no cure for this chronic respiratory

condition, modern medicine has made living with
asthma manageable.
2. COPD

 Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease is an

umbrella term that encompasses several respiratory
illnesses that cause breathlessness or the inability to
exhale normally.

 Symptoms are often mistaken for gradual aging

process and body deterioration.

 COPD can develop over the course of several years

without any signs of shortness of breath.

 Estimated over 24 million people currently have

COPD but around half of them don’t know about it.

 This respiratory disease is caused by smoking,

genetics and environmental factors like pollution.
3. Bronchitis

 The respiratory disease is divided into chronic and acute

bronchitis.

 Chronic Bronchitis is a form of COPD that emphasized

by a chronic cough.

 Acute Bronchitis is an infection caused by a virus.

 In both cases, the mucous membrane in the lungs

becomes inflamed in the bronchial passage.

 This causes swelling that shuts off the airways in the

lungs.

 Both acute and chronic bronchitis require consistent

medical treatment.

 Acute Bronchitis should subside after the infection is

gone.
4. Emphysema

 This serious respiratory disease is another

form of COPD.

 Those who suffer from emphysema have

trouble exhaling air from their lungs.

 Cigarette smoke damages the air sacs in the

lungs to a point where they can no longer
repair themselves.

 Emphysema evolves slowly over the years

and has no cure.
5. Lung Cancer

 Most often, the cancer develops in the main

part of the lungs near the air sacs.

 DNA mutations in the lungs cause irregular

cells to multiply and create an uncontrolled
growth of abnormal cells, or tumor.

 These tumor interfere with the regular

functions of the lungs.

 Symptoms can take longer to appear, but

include things like chronic coughing, changes
in voice, harsh breathing sounds, coughing up
blood and many others.
6. Cystic Fibrosis

 This genetic respiratory disease is caused by a gene that

creates sticky and thick mucus.

 This mucus causes repeated, and dangerous, lung

infections as well as obstructions in the pancreas that
prevents important enzymes from breaking down
nutrients for the body.

 The disease affects 30,000 thousand people and 75 % of

which were diagnosed by the age of two.

 Few children who had cystic fibrosis lived long enough

to attend elementary school but thanks to modern
medicine, the life expectancy of a child with this
respiratory disease has doubled.

 Symptoms of cystic fibrosis is salt-tasting skin, chronic

coughing, frequent lung infections and a poor growth
rate in children.
7. Pneumonia

 This lung disease is caused by an infection in the

air sacs in the lungs.

 The infections can be caused by bacteria, a virus or

a fungi.

 Most people can recover from one to three weeks,

but can be life threatening.

 Symptoms, which include cough, fever, shaking

chills, and shortness of breath, can range from mild
to severe.
8. Allergies

 This condition is one of the most common chronic

problems world-wide.

 The most common culprits of allergic reactions are

pollen, dust, food, insect stings, animal dander,
mold, medications and latex.

 These reactions often affect the nose, lungs, throat,

and sinuses.
Common Culprit: Smoking

 Cigarette smoking is either a cause or an

exacerbator of every respiratory disease.

 It is the leading cause of preventable illness and

death produces 443,000 deaths a year, around
49,000 of which are caused by secondhand smoke.

 90 % of men and 80 % of women who died from

lung cancer were smokers.
Thank You
and

God bless!