An exacerbation is a deterioration in the
level of control experienced by a person
with asthma. The level and duration of deterioration is important and a full history
should be obtained to help identify
whether the person is normally well – has
the asthma been like this for a period of
weeks or months or, if is it are usually well
controlled, has a loss of control happened
over the past few days? Both of these scenarios
may have similar, if not identical,
clinical presentations. Tattersfield et al
(2004) found the pattern of deterioration
in 425 exacerbations started around eight
days before presentation and that it took a
similar amount of time to get back to the
previous level of control