Emphysema and chronic bronchitis. Usually these are caused by smoking, but there are things that you can actually do to improve the symptoms of your COPD, if you’ve already been diagnosed with it.
So, let’s talk about how to make COPD better if you’ve already got it. But first, please take a moment and share this article on your social media, on your Twitter, on your Facebook, on your Instagram, wherever you have friends and family members who have emphysema, chronic bronchitis, if you have that uncle or that sister or that brother or that mother who have breathing problems, share this article with them, please it helps us to help them. So, let’s talk about COPD and ways that you can help it to be better. You can’t really cure it once you’ve got it, but you can keep it from getting worse and actually make the symptoms less severe by doing the following things.
First and foremost, you need to get tested, if you’ve been diagnosed with COPD,emphysema, chronic bronchitis, and you’ve never had a PFT or a pulmonary function test or lung function testing, and the way you’ll know you’ve had this is if you’ve ever taken a deep deep breath and you’ve blown really hard into the tube while the lady was saying blow blow blow, then you had a your lungs tested properly, to see how severe your COPD is and to see which medications you need to be on to treat the symptoms and keep it from getting worse.
If you’ve never had your lung function tested like that, talk to your doctor and say hey, I was supposed to get my lung function tested if I have COPD or Emphysema or chronic bronchitis, and at which point your doctor will say oh yes, you should have that done in the way they do in their office or they’ll send you to the hospital to have it done. But only when you know your numbers and you are able to tell how much better you’ve made it by doing the following things.
Most people with COPD or chronic bronchitis or emphysema are older, and a lot of them think that they are past the age of training, past the age of improving and that’s just not true at all. Your lung function can improve, you can make it better. Even my older patients I tell them that you’re still an athlete you may not be able to run a marathon or break the weight lifting record but you’re still an athlete and your body will improve if you expose it to good stress like walking, lifting weights, you can actually make your lung function better. So, don’t think that you’re washed up and over the hill, that’s just not true regardless of your age, it’s never too late to make improvements and you can improve your lung function, you can improve the numbers on your lung function test by exercising more. Now you may have to start this very slowly and increase it very gradually, depending on how bad how severe your COPD is, but you can definitely at least a little bit improve your lung function by exercising more.
The next thing is by either eating more omega three fatty acids or about taking a supplement if you just can’t get omega three in your diet.
You have to always remember that no matter what body part we’re talking about, it is made of what you’ve eaten, it’s built of what you’ve put in your mouth. So, if you’re eating junk and expecting your lung function to get lots better than it currently is, that’s probably not going to happen. But if you’ll start increasing your intake of omega three fatty acids not Omega six is but omega three, and a quick Google search will tell you what has omega three in it. And if there’s just no way you can eat more omega three rich foods then you’ll take a supplement and that’s fine make sure to try to take a good quality supplement that you trust.
The next is to take vitamin D. And you will take vitamin D3 not vitamin D2. A lot of folks have vitamin D2 prescribed by their doctor but you need vitamin D3.
It’s more readily absorbed by your body and it levels up where they need to be. So, if your doctor hands you a prescription for vitamin D2, nod and smile and then go to the health food store and get some vitamin D3 and take however much you need a day every day to get your numbers up.
And for most people that’s two thousand to ten thousand international units of vitamin D3 a day, make sure your doctor is checking your vitamin D25 levels, because you don’t want your level to be low most importantly, but also less importantly you don’t want your level to be too high, if it is just back up on your dose a little bit that’s all you do.
But if it’s low, then you’re not going to be reaping the maximum C O P D benefits.Take your vitamin D it’s very important.
The next is, I already touched on it but your lungs are made of what you’ve eaten over the last three months. So, if you’re eating lots of wheats and whole grain and sweets and sugars and starches, then you’re not going to get the maximum improvement in your lung function testing that you get if you’re eating a Ketogenic paleo diet. If you’re trying to lose weight, then you need to be more on the ketogenic, and if you’re just trying to maintain and build good body tissue, then paleo keto is fine but you have to get the crap out of your diets. And I’m sorry to be blunt, but if you’re eating stuff that comes in a cardboard box, that has forty ingredients that’s crap, stop that, it’s bad for you in hundreds of ways, but today it’s very very bad for your lung function, it will never help improve your lung function with C O P D.
Lastly is most important of all is stop smoking and stop being around any smoke at all.
And I saved this for last because what I want to tell you smokers out there, who are looking at me now go on yep I knew it was coming. If you don’t stop smoking then all the other things that I’ve talked about combined won’t cancel the smoking. The smoking will cancel out all the other benefits that you’re getting from all the other things I just talked about if you continue to smoke. Yeah, it’s that bad, you have to stop smoking. Let’s talk about vaping for a second or e-cigarettes. They are much less bad for you than cigarettes. Hundred times of less bad. Now don’t miss-hear me, they’re not good, they’re bad, oh yeah they’re bad but they’re much less bad. So, if you cannot quit cigarettes without using a vape, then vape it’s fun. It’s not good for you but it’s much less bad than the cigarettes, and your lungs can probably make some improvements if you’re vaping a minimal amount. But if you’re going to keep smoking cigarettes, you can just forget everything else I just said in this article.
Now if you enjoyed this and it has helped you to become motivated to improve your health, to improve your lung function feel free to share to your friends and relatives.
If you want to discuss more or learn about how portable oxygen concentrator can help together with the right diet and exercise please click here to speak with our oxygen consultant.