Q&A: asthma

Q: Do you have ideas for easy breathing or bronchial fitness, for my husband's asthma? We bought a Yogi Tea that seems to help, but I was wondering if you know of any alternatives.

A: I have not been very educated in this area myself, even though I have asthma. So this was a good exercise for me! Here are some ideas.

Omega-3s are important for prevention because they are an anti-inflammatory. If your husband eats fatty fish and eggs, those are good sources, but he can also add flaxseed to his diet. The cheapest way to do this is just to buy whole flaxseed and grind it yourself. Then you can add it to baked goods and sprinkle it on breakfast foods. This would be a really good thing to do as far as asthma is concerned, and also just overall health. One tablespoon a day should be sufficient.

Vitamin C is also important, to protect the lung tissue and prevent infection; it also increases air flow and helps to fight inflammation. You can get this from fruits and green vegetables.

In the middle of an attack, some people have had good success using zinc lozenges, which may shorten an asthma attack or prevent it from becoming severe.

Some asthmatics are deficient in Coenzyme Q10, which is important for countering histamine. You can get Co-Q10 in fish, meat, eggs, cruciferous vegetables, greens, peanuts and whole grains.

If his asthma is at all related to allergies, he might try using locally-produced honey and bee pollen as preventatives. Many people have had good success with treating allergies and asthma this way.


As for herbs:

Lobelia extract is helpful during an attack, as a relaxant and expectorant. It should not be taken on an ongoing basis; that is, not as a preventative, only as a treatment.

If you can find some loose-leaf mullein at an herb shop, you can infuse your own oil. Mullein oil is very powerful for asthma attacks. Taken fruit juice or tea, it often provides almost instant relief during an attack.

You can also buy loose-leaf pau d'arco. As a preventative daily tea it shows good success in studies.

You could just make your own preventative tea instead of buying one that is pre-mixed. Your own tea will be cheaper and more effective; you can never know how long those packaged teas have been sitting around, and herbs lose their effectiveness after a while. A good tea would combine licorice root (an expectorant), slippery elm bark (an expectorant that also soothes the lung tissues), echinacea (an immune stimulant), and ginger root (a stimulant and soothing tonic for muscles). You could add mullein and pau d'arco as well. This tea should not be taken every day continuously. Perhaps he could drink it for one week, then take one week off, and so on, or you could just omit the echinacea and licorice root.

Also, homeopathic belladonna relaxes the bronchioles of the lungs, so it can be a good treatment for an attack.


As for diet:

Gas-inducing foods, like cabbage and beans, can put added stress on the diaphragm. Large meals do the same thing. Fruits and vegetables, brown rice, oatmeal and other whole grains, whole nuts and seeds, a good amount of protein, and as little sugar as he can manage are some good standards. Garlic, onions and other alliums contain quercetin, which inhibit enzymes that cause inflammatory reactions. A high salt intake in people who are very active has been shown to contribute to asthma attacks.


As for lifestyle:

I don't know if removing carpeting, at least in the bedroom, is an option for you, but it's recommended that you at least try to cover your mattress in a plastic sheet and/or wash your sheets in hot water once a week to reduce allergens.

I'd also encourage him to take up yoga. Your husband is very active already, but yoga really retrains a person how to breathe. It exercises the lungs in a gentle way.

Many people end up with asthma because of undiagnosed food allergies. He might try an elimination diet at some point in the future.


This is a lot of information and, as always, I'm not recommending that you do everything here. Just pick two or three ideas that are manageable for you. If it were me, I would go with the mullein oil, the flaxseed, the preventative tea and I'd maybe pick up some zinc lozenges. These are reasonably cheap and easy options.

Let me know if you have any other questions.