How to cure respiratory diseases

Let me pour cold water on everyone first. Most respiratory diseases cannot achieve the "radical cure" that everyone thinks - that is, they will never relapse after being treated for a lifetime. Only mild bacterial pneumonia and acute bacterial pharyngitis, which are caused by a clear single exogenous pathogen infection and do not leave irreversible airway damage, can be completely cured through a sufficient course of anti-infective treatment. As long as they are not infected with the same pathogen again, they will not get sick.

Two years ago, I treated a young man who had suffered from allergic rhinitis for almost 10 years. He tried several folk remedies to "clear the root cause", stuffed herbs into his nose and took so-called immune conditioning pills. After more than half a year, the nasal mucosa was corroded and ruptured repeatedly. During the season change this year, he sneezed more fiercely than before, and also developed conjunctivitis. In fact, the onset of common chronic respiratory diseases such as allergic rhinitis, asthma, chronic bronchitis, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is the result of the interaction of multiple factors. Either it is its own immune susceptibility, or the airway has been irreversibly damaged due to long-term irritation. It is like a rubber band that has been stretched repeatedly until it loses its elasticity. No matter how good the treatment, it cannot completely return it to its original state.

Some people may ask, is it true that desensitization treatment promoted by many institutions can cure allergic respiratory diseases? This is actually a matter of cognitive differences. At present, desensitization treatment for specific allergens is indeed relatively mature. A small number of patients can achieve no allergic symptoms for more than ten years or even longer after persisting in standardized treatment for 3 to 5 years. Many patients themselves feel that this is a "radical cure", but the academic community generally defines this state as "long-term clinical remission" - after all, if there is a long-term stay up late, major illness, or significant fluctuations in immune status, there is still the possibility of recurrence, and it cannot be regarded as a 100% cure.

Having been in the respiratory department for almost ten years, I have seen too many patients who are obsessed with finding "radical cures" and neglect the most basic disease management. Take the elderly patients with COPD as an example. If they can strictly quit smoking, get vaccinated against influenza and pneumonia in advance during the season, and use inhaled preparations regularly according to the doctor's instructions, even if the disease cannot be completely eradicated, they can still do it without affecting their daily activities, avoid hospitalization for several years, and their quality of life is not much different from that of healthy people. Which method is closest to the "radical cure" effect that everyone wants, but it is the daily protection that is most easily underestimated: wear a mask when going out in haze and pollen season, avoid going to places with heavy oil smoke and second-hand smoke, maintain a regular schedule to stabilize the immune state, and cut off the factors that induce the disease as much as possible, so naturally you will not have to suffer repeatedly.