Does asthma cause chest tightness? Why?

Asthma is a common bronchial disease. Some patients with asthma may experience chest tightness. Chest tightness is a symptom and is also a common symptom in internal medicine diseases. Asthma can also cause chest tightness in patients.

People often feel chest tightness and fatigue when they stay in a room with closed doors and windows and poor air circulation for a long time, or encounter some unpleasant things, or even have quarrels or disputes with others, or are in a climate with low air pressure. After a short rest, opening windows for ventilation or going outside to breathe fresh air, relaxing your mind and regulating your emotions, you will soon return to normal. This type of chest tightness can be said to be functional chest tightness, and there is no need to worry or seek treatment.

Chest tightness is a symptom that may occur in many diseases, but mainly in internal medicine diseases, the most common of which is cardiovascular disease. The incidence of sudden death from heart disease is higher in the cold winter, especially from December to February of the following year. In particular, the incidence of acute myocardial infarction increases significantly in continuous low temperature, rainy and windy weather. People in their forties and fifties should pay extra attention.

Asthma is manifested by paroxysmal cough, chest tightness and difficulty breathing. Some patients cough up sputum, which is more common when the attack is tending to ease. If there is no concurrent infection, the sputum is often white and sticky, with a tough texture, and sometimes in the shape of rice grains or mucus columns. The severity and duration of an attack vary greatly from person to person. In mild cases, there is only a feeling of chest tightness that lasts for a few minutes, while in severe cases, there is extreme difficulty breathing that lasts for weeks or longer.

The symptom is characterized by reversibility, that is, it can be relieved in a relatively short period of time after treatment, some are relieved naturally, and of course, a small number do not get relieved and remain in a persistent state. Attacks often have certain inducing factors. Many patients have obvious biological patterns in their attacks, with attacks or worsening between 2 and 6 a.m. every day. They usually occur at the turn of spring and summer or in winter. Some women (about 20%) have asthma attacks or worsening before or during menstruation. Pay attention to patients with atypical asthma.

Some patients often have paroxysmal cough as their only symptom, which is often misdiagnosed as bronchitis clinically; some adolescent patients have chest tightness and shortness of breath during exercise as their only clinical manifestations.