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Dr / Fayka Al Raqoum
Head of Dept
Asthma is
a leading cause of chronic illness in childhood. Before puberty, approximately
twice as many boys as girls are affected, thereafter the sex incidence is equal.
Asthma can lead to severe psycho-social disturbance in the family, with proper
treatment, however, satisfactory control of symptoms is usually possible.
There is no universally
accepted definition of asthma. It may be regarded as a diffuse, obstructive lung
disease with (1) hyper reactivity of the airway to variety of stimuli and
(2) a
high degree of reversibility of the obstructive presses which may occur
spontaneously or as a result of treatment. Inflammation is an important
pathologic factor. Mast cells, eosinophils, activated T lymphocytes, macrophages
and neutrophils have key roles in the chronic inflammation of asthma. Also known
as reactive airway disease, the asthma complex probably includes wheezy
bronchitis, viral-associated wheezy and atopic-related asthma.
Children from 3 months to 14
years were attending asthma clinic at Al Sabah hospital have been carefully
evaluated and followed up regularly. Evaluation consisted of detailed history,
clinical examination, radiological, immunological and pulmonary function test
for older children.
We consider child to be
asthmatic if he had 3 or more episodes of wheezy chest and or dyspnea regardless
of the age, taking in consideration that about 5% of childhood asthma is present
with chronic or recurrent cough as the only symptom.
Our clinic receive referral
from Casualty department, Sabah hospital upon discharge, Poly clinic, Al Rashid
Allergy Centre as well as other clinics in the regional area.
The following are
our goals in
manifesting children with asthma:
1.
To maximally control symptoms of asthma with minimal number of
medication.
2.
To educate the child and the family about asthma and its
management
3.
To allow the child to grow and develop normally
4.
To limit the medication related side effects
Parents
who are attending our asthma clinic were first subjected to education programme
that have been told how they can live with asthmatic child, and how they can
deal with simple acute attack with environmental control, harmful factors that
can often be avoided.
Our asthma clinic run by one
Consultant Dr. Fayqa Al Raqum and one Specialist Dr. Nada Al Terkait and two
Registrars Dr. Abdul Jabar and Dr. Najat Hussain. The clinic is on Monday, we
can see 30 pts./day, 135 pts/month, 1593 pts/year. Now total number of asthmatic
patients attending asthma clinic until last clinic on 28/7/03 are 3400.
Tel : -- 4812000 -- ext -- 6104
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