How to prevent the exacerbation of COPD?

Patients who got Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (called COPD) are prone to long-term hypoxia due to various reasons. Hypoxia can cause varying degrees of harm to the body, including increased pulmonary vascular resistance, pulmonary hypertension, chronic cor pulmonale, heart failure, red blood cells, increased blood viscosity and malnutrition.

These harms will aggravate the patient's condition, lead to an increase in the number of hospitalizations, and a decrease in the quality of life and survival rate. Therefore, oxygen therapy plays a very important role in patients with COPD, but in practical applications, many people have a variety of adverse reactions and harms due to insufficient knowledge or misunderstandings, leading to excessive oxygen therapy, but they often do not know it.

So, how to prevent the exacerbation of COPD? We can pay attention to the following aspects:

Environment

Patients with COPD must have a clean-air living environment. They must do a good job of protection to avoid the impact of irritating and harmful gases, such as dust on the respiratory system. And it’s better to insist on breathing fresh air every day.

Habit

Maintain a regular lifestyle. According to the physical condition, insist on proper exercise, get more sunshine. Please keep warm to prevent colds, flu, chronic bronchitis and infectious diseases.

Note

Patients with COPD should ban smoking and alcohol. Long-term heavy smoking can cause lung cancer and obstructive emphysema; alcoholism can cause digestive system and cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, and it also has a serious impact on the respiratory system.

Oxygen therapy

Long-term home oxygen therapy can delay the further development of the disease, reduce respiratory infections, and improve the quality of life of patients.

The goal of long-term home oxygen therapy is to prevent COPD patients from experiencing severe hypoxia during rest, sleep, and activities through oxygen therapy, and eliminate the adverse effects of chronic hypoxia on health.

Treatment

Standardized treatment is very important. Patients with COPD should continue to take stable-phase drugs for maintenance treatment to improve lung function, improve quality of life and prevent infection. If symptoms worsen, they should go to the hospital early for treatment.

The method of home oxygen therapy:T

Oxygen concentrator: Using power supply device, make the air through the molecular sieve to separate oxygen, nitrogen and other inert gases. In the range of 1-10 liters/min oxygen flow rate, different purity of oxygen can be provided. It is convenient to use indoors without regular replacement, and is suitable for long-term oxygen therapy at home.

Oxygen inhalation method: double-cavity nasal catheter oxygen method, nasal congestion oxygen method , mask oxygen method.

The oxygen supply equipment used varies from person to person, but the amount of oxygen is the same. That is, when starting to inhale oxygen, the doctor should determine the amount of inhaled oxygen according to the condition, and strive to use the least flow of oxygen to achieve the greatest effect. Usually start with a low flow rate , adjust the oxygen flow rate to about 1-3 liters/min, and increase the flow rate appropriately during sleep. Oxygen therapy should last about 15 hours a day.

In short, long-term home oxygen therapy is very practical for COPD patients. It should be carried out under the guidance of a specialist for the first time, adjust the appropriate oxygen flow rate, keep the oxygen humidification and the humidification bottle clean. At the same time, it is necessary to adhere to the treatment and persevere in order to achieve the desired effect.