Your aims during an asthma attack are to ease the breathing and if necessary get medical help.
- You need to keep the casualty calm and reassure them.
- If they have a blue reliever inhaler then encourage them to use it. Children may have a spacer device and you should encourage them to use that with their inhaler also. It should relieve the attack within a few minutes.
- Encourage the casualty to breathe slowly and deeply.
- Encourage the casualty to sit in a position that they find most comfortable, often leaning forward with arms resting on a table or the back of a chair. Do not lie the casualty down.
- A mild asthma attack should ease within three minutes but if it doesn’t encourage the casualty to use their inhaler again. Caution:
- The inhaler has no effect after five minutes
- The casualty is becoming worse
- Breathlessness makes talking difficult
- The casualty becomes exhausted.
- Encourage the casualty to use their inhaler every five to 10 minutes
- Monitor and record the breathing and pulse rate every 10 minutes.
If this is the first attack, or if the attack is severe and any one of the following occurs: