For any asthmatic or any person who needs to be seen in a clinic or Drs surgery they will more often than not be requested to do some kind of breathing test. In a GP setting this tends to be peak flow measuring your peak expiratory flow rate in litres per minute. Pretty much every asthmatic should have a peak flow device and if not you should be asking your asthma nurse or GP for one. It is one of the most useful home tools to identify how well you condition is.
However as a condition progresses or becomes more challenging to keep in control further testing may be needed. Patients attending any respiratory clinic in a hospital will probably be sent to the dreaded lung function room first to a variety of different breathing tests from FEV, FEV1 or perhaps flow loops.
I hate lung function, mostly because my lung function is not as good as it used to be but also because I have so much pain for some reason in my left hand side at the lower lung area. We are not sure why its sore but most likely muscular but nothing that serious. I find doing my FVC or forced vital capacity is not a problem because breathing out all the way is not too hard unless I am having an attack. My issue comes when I have to do my forced expiratory volume in 1 second. You have to take a big breath in and then blow out as hard and fast as possible until empty. This is where I get sore. I just always get a really sharp stabbing when I move from breathing in to breathing out hard. It stops me in my tracks. It makes me feel like I have been winded or kicked in the ribs- so understandably I don’t like doing it.
More recently there has been a new device introduced into the lung function world and the lung function room which I don’t mind so much, now that I have got the hang of it. It is FeNo or Exhaled nitric oxide. FeNo is measuring the amount of inflammation present in your airways which can identify how well controlled your asthma is. This is an odd test where you have this handheld white box thing which you need to breath in through and out though at a certain rate. I have done this test with a number of different people who all have different strategies. The aim of the test is to keep a cloud between two lines by breathing out through the machine at a certain rate. You can do this by watching yourself in a mirror so you can see the cloud which is on the side of the machine facing away from you or you can have the pulmonary function technician telling you to blow harder or softer which is very amusing and totally puts me off. Even watching myself puts me off as I just laugh. I have got used to the face I make and don’t laugh quite as much and don’t need as many attempts as I used to. I think I would on occasion leave them all shaking their heads when they had a busy clinic and was laughing at myself thus holding proceedings up!!! (I will find/ get a video of myself doing the FeNo test so you can see what I mean!!).
From what you have read so far you can probably guess that I don’t like doing lung function. I don’t think I will ever like doing it, so you can imagine when a few months ago in clinic my consultant suggested coming for lung function every two weeks and then emailing her the result. I was not amused and she went out of the clinic room to speak to lung function to sort it all out before the news really set in. When she was away all sorts of things were going through my head and thinking of ways I could get out of doing lung function every 2 weeks but I couldn’t think of much as I work in the same hospital as I work in so could not say I was too busy and wouldn’t be able to get away!!
I was so relieved when she came back and told me that it would only be the exhaled nitric oxide (FeNo) I would be doing every 2 weeks. I was relieved that none of the other tests would need to be done!! I was a bit skeptical at first about what FeNo every two weeks would achieve but now I am 2 months down the line and can really see where it has been really useful and helped me and my consultant make progress in my prednisilone reduction. Before it was a case of reduce the prednisilone by a few mg and then see how I did. Most of the time I would reduce for a few months, be fine and then have an attack which meant y dose was increased again. This time was different. I would do the FeNo test then email my consultant tell her the result and she would make a recommendation about what to do with my dose. So this way we know what is going on at the point of reduction rather than waiting and seeing what happens. I have repeated the rewards from it as we have managed to stick to the plan and I have been managing to go every two weeks pretty much give the odd day late here or there!!
This is the first time I have felt an element of control in my asthma. Perhaps it is a bit of a psychological result as well because I have had so many failed attempts at medication reduction when we go by the wait and see plan however now with FeNo I know I am good, bad or indifferent so have that reassurance that we are reducing at the right time.
I guess the two weekly lung function or as it turned out FeNo was not as bad as I first thought!!! It has been really good and the benefits certainly are better then the pain of going down to pulmonary function. Fingers crossed for continued progress. I am sure there will be the ups and downs but I guess it keeps like interesting!!
I must recommend FeNo to anyone. More hospitals are bringing it in and give a far better picture of how your lungs are actually doing.
ANONYMOUS-ASTHMA 