ABU DHABI // Doctors have been wrongly prescribing inhalers for patients who are suffering shortness of breath, health professionals say.
They say the doctors, who often see up to 50 patients a day, are not being thorough enough in their diagnoses.
“In about 30 to 40 per cent of all the patients I see, I stop the asthma medicines,” said Dr Zouhair Harb, a pulmonary consultant at Advanced Cure Diagnostic Centre.
“There are certain other patients on antibiotics and I need to take them off these because they actually have asthma.”
Ventolin inhalers should be used only by asthmatics, and the reasons for the patients’ breathlessness – which could be a lung, heart or blood-flow problem – can be missed.
Dr Harb said other causes for shortness of breath are changes in hormones, thyroid gland problems or even anxiety.
“If you go to a doctor and tell them you have shortness of breath and they immediately give you an inhaler, walk away from that doctor as far as you can,” he said.
A 2011 study of the population found that 9.8 per cent of adults between the ages of 20 and 44 years had asthma.
Dr Harb said younger women often suffered from breathing difficulties caused by blood loss during their periods. The country’s climate could also be to blame.
“In UAE, we tend to use the air conditioner too much,” he said. “There are dust mites in curtains and carpets, and the AC is a big source of mould.”
Dr Harb has recently held courses for doctors in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Al Ain to help them to properly diagnose asthma and improve its management, especially in the lead-up to summer when asthma symptoms can worsen.
Dr James Hull, consultant respiratory physician at the Royal Brompton and Harefield hospitals in London, is planning to research the effects of dusty environments on breathing difficulties in Doha. “Pollution and dusty environment play a role and this may make you feel breathless,” Dr Hull said. “This may occur even if you don’t have asthma.” He added that being overweight was a factor in lung conditions.
Chronic breathlessness affects about 10 per cent of the general population in the UK and about 30 per cent of the elderly, Dr Hull said.
The World Health Organisation estimated that 12.6 million people died as a result of living or working in an unhealthy environment in 2012
arizvi@thenational.ae
