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Fall Allergy & Asthma Tips - TPR's In Focus - Nov. 4, 2026 · In Focus with Carolyn Hutcheson

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  Support comes from Troy University's Trojan Cafe,
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  offering handcrafted Starbucks beverages and a wide assortment of
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  meal and snack options, located on Troy University's Montgomery campus
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  across from the Rosa Parks Library and Museum.
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  From Troy Public Radio, this is In Focus,
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  and I'm Carolyn Hutcheson. For children and adults
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  who live with allergies and asthma, Fall can
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  be a challenging season. Dr. Michael Blaiss,
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  clinical professor at the Medical College of Georgia
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  at Augusta University, joins us today from
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  his office in Roswell with his advice on how to cope.
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  Dr. Blaise is past president of the American College
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  of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology.
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  Dr. Blaise, thank you for joining us.
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  Thanks for having me today. For people who are listening to you
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  right now who do not have a clear understanding
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  of allergy and asthma, give us sort of a short definition.
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  So allergy is the body reacting to
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  something that generally should not cause a reaction.
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  It's really the patient has a hyperimmune system. So that
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  patient that eats a peanut and goes into an allergic
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  reaction, or that patient this time of year in the fall
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  with ragweed in the air, they breathe that in and
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  that in fact triggers an asthma attack.
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  Those are kind of examples related to allergy.
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  And when we talk about asthma, it is a condition that
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  can be triggered by allergies, as we just mentioned, ragweed being one.
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  And this is a chronic inflammatory disease
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  of the airways. Where we have underlying
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  inflammation, where we can get mucus produced in the lungs. That's why
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  people with asthma cough and wheeze. And we get also
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  bronchoconstriction, which means the air tubes close down,
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  which also makes it difficult to breathe.
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  So this is a condition that affects about 6
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  to 7% of the adult population in the United States,
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  and in fact, 8 to 9% depending on the studies
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  you look at in the pediatric population.
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  We don't have a cure for this condition, but we have many different
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  treatments that can be used that can help control it
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  so that the patient can do their normal activities.
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  One of the treatments is an asthma inhaler, and yet
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  there are different policies in different schools about
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  whether a child can carry that inhaler or
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  whether it stays with the school nurse. What is your
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  idea about that? The child should be
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  able to have their inhaler at all times
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  with them. And we're talking about their rescue inhaler,
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  albuterol, which helps relieve that closing
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  down of the airways. Any school-aged
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  child can, in my opinion, use the inhaler
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  correctly and safely. And in fact, if that child is having
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  a severe asthma flare-up at school,
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  they need to be able to get access to that inhaler absolutely
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  as fast as possible. And the problem is, if the child
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  can't hold on to that inhaler, say it's in a
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  nurse's office, but they're out at the playground or something,
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  minutes can lead to a severe life-threatening reaction.
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  What about when that child is on the school bus going to
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  school or coming home, or they're in the
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  gym, or they're on field trips, or on after-school sports? If the
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  inhaler is locked up in a nurse's office, how are they going to get it?
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  So I'm a very strong believer, and I have
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  faith in the children I take care of, that in fact
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  this is safe enough for them to carry. In case there is an emergency.
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  And I think the risk of not having it is so much
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  higher than, say, the risk of them using it when they shouldn't
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  or maybe taking a little more than they should. I'm not worried
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  about those types of things. I'm worried about that child not having
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  it and they're having a severe asthma flare-up.
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  And so the good news is all the states
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  that would hear this program, we're talking about Georgia, Alabama, Florida, they all have state
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  laws that children can carry and self-administrate
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  their albuterol inhaler. Now, each state has
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  different policies, like what forms have to be signed by the parents,
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  what forms have to be signed by the physician who's
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  taking care of the child, but all of these have laws that
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  have passed that a child can carry their short-acting
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  bronchodilator, their rescue inhaler. What are some of the
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  signs that a patient needs a specialist,
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  an asthma allergy specialist?
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  One is that primary care physicians, where we talk
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  about in pediatrics, you know, primary care or pediatrician,
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  I think most of those patients can in fact taken care of
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  by their primary care doctor. I think they need to see a
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  specialist when in fact that primary care doctor feels
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  that with the level of treatment that they've given the patient,
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  the patient is still having what I would call poor control asthma.
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  So what do we mean by poor control asthma?
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  The patient is having daytime symptoms more
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  than a couple of times a week. They're waking up at night
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  more than twice a month related to their asthma,
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  if they're having to refill their rescue inhaler, their albuterol,
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  more than a couple times a year, they've required more than 2
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  steroid bursts in the last year. So again, if they're having
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  significant symptoms, significant need for their rescue
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  inhaler, and they're not responding to the treatment from the
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  primary care doctor, then I think it will be time to
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  see an allergist or a pulmonologist. Dr. Blaise, you are
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  past president and former executive director of the American College
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  of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology. So how
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  can people get reliable information about
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  allergy and asthma? It's very disturbing
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  to me. We see so much disinformation in
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  social media and also concerns now with all the
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  AI chatbots as far as information
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  that in fact could be harmful to the patient associated
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  with asthma. I think it's something that we all should
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  be very concerned about because we're starting to
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  see patients only get to see us as clinicians, you know,
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  maybe 2 or 3 times a year. But they're
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  connecting to social media, they're connecting to chatbots on
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  a completely daily basis. Maybe getting a lot of misinformation
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  was found on TikTok. And I think it's important to
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  get good information out there so that patients
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  know about the condition and can get the best treatment possible for it.
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  So they need to go to sites that are done by professionals.
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  Both lay organizations and allergy and pulmonary professional
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  organizations where they can get information that
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  in fact has been verified to be accurate. So,
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  the Allergy Asthma Network, which I'm on the medical advisory board,
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  they've got a great site called controlyourasthma.org.
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  They also have it in Spanish, and I take care of a lot of Spanish
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  patients in the Atlanta area. There's the American
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  College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology, and that's at
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  acai.org. There's the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology.
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  There's what's called GINA, which is G-I-N-A,
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  and this is an international group that puts together
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  the diagnosis and information related to asthma,
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  and it's at gina.org.
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  Sthma.org. So I
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  think that there is a lot of good information out
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  there, but unfortunately patients have to hunt for it because
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  at least with the different algorithms out there, whether we talk about social
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  media or we talk about the AI chatbots,
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  a lot of that information is coming from non-professionals.
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  And there are now many studies that show that a lot of that information
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  is completely untrue. Well, Dr. Blaise, I wanna thank
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  you for your time today and for being our guest. You're welcome.
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  That was Dr. Michael Blaiss, past president of
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  the American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology,
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  joining us from his office in Roswell, Georgia.
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  More information can be found at the allergyasthmanetwork.org
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  website. Thanks for joining us for In Focus,
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  which is a podcast wherever you get your podcasts.
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  And feel free to get in touch at infocus@troy.edu.
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  I'm Carolyn Hutcheson, and this is listener-supported
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  Troy Public Radio.