When you exercise, you take short quick breaths through your mouth. Most times you breathe thru your nose which warms and humidifies the air before it makes its way to your lungs and airways. When you are taking quick breaths through your mouth, this cooler, drier air doesn't get a chance to be warmed up and humidified. Having exercise induced asthma means that your lungs and airways are very sensitive to this cold, dry air.

Symptoms of EIA are the same as the ones for other asthma types. They include a tight chest, wheezing, coughing, and shortness of breath.

Some good ways to know if you have exercise induced asthma are:

1. You feeling winded more quickly than the other people you are exercising with.

2. You cough immediately after coming inside from exercising.

3. You are unable to exercise for more than a few minutes without taking a break. Of course, this doesn't apply if you are just out of shape.

The severity of your symptoms will be different from other people. For some people the symptoms can begin just five minutes after starting physical activity. For others, they do not begin until after the exercise is over. Some people have their symptoms last for several hours even after stopping their activity.

When treating this disease, many doctors will prescribe the same quick-relief inhalers that are used for normal asthma attacks. The only difference is that you will be instructed to you use the inhaler immediately before you do any physical activity. These quick-relief inhalers are also known as rescue medication. A long term medication could also might also be prescribed. This is the type of medication that is taken daily as a preventive measure. It is also referred to as controller medication.

For some, even with taking both a preventive and a controller medication, it will be extremely difficult to participate in certain strenuous physical activities. There are many pro athletes who continue to participate despite having asthma. So even if you have trouble with certain activities, there are still many other physical activities that can be tried.

Some of these include walking, jogging, hiking, and golf. These are good activities to get some exercise with, but do not put anyone that has exercise induced asthma in serious danger of physical risks. This does not mean that you will not be able to take part in sports such as basketball and distance running, even though these sports carry more of a risk for asthmatics. Sometimes, the more you take part in a certain activity, the more your body becomes accustomed to it.

Taking prescription asthma medications has many downsides. The biggest of these is the possibility of getting one of the dangerous side effects. And since they don't even try to cure your exercise induced asthma, you will have to take them for the rest of your life.

Many people are switching to natural cures for asthma and getting outstanding results. We are talking about cures that are the result of years of research and backed by clinical trials. There are no side effects of any type with these and many people see their symptoms start to disappear within days.