Hi bunwhisper,

well, please accept my sympathetic feelings regarding your actual condition. Having coughed up blood would of course mean that seeing a real live doctor is mandatory.

I know from experience that coughing up buckets of mucus is a symptom of bronchitis. I've found (a) european ivy preparations (b) bhastrika (bellows breathing from yoga) to gently push up the mucus and of course (c) any sort of physical exercise, helpful. Drinking masses of water, as usually recommended, did not seem to help much.

I did faithfully rely on asthma drugs (no steroids) for years, but then in a dramatic worsening of my condition (commuting by car) was surprised to find that a sort of pursed lips breathing could curb any attack and left me far better the morning after than with drug usage. Plb means that you have to prolong about ten breaths in an attack, which takes some doing, see the excellent descriptions of your admirable prof. Deane hillsman of ucla (http://www.Ohiou.Edu/isarp/conf_00/papr_1 9.Htm and also http://www.Ohiou.Edu/isarp/conf_02/papr_4. Htm).

Since then i've tried out some alternative methods (including "buteyko", which seems to be nonsense) and discussed a lot to come to the conclusion that orthodox asthma treatment in many cases does not make sense. If you debrief yourself with Dr. Peper's modern psychological explanation of the asthma mechanism (http://www.I-breathe.Com/thb12/incentiv.H tm) you may, like I did, come to the conclusion that the idea of asthma being an "organic" disease like diabetes with tissue damage as the basic cause, is probably wrong. Or asthma can be treated as if this were wrong. I. E. Asthma is a functional disorder like a bad body posture able to be corrected by remedial exercises. Specifically, if someone's condition is such that an "asthma diagnosis" is merited, it can probably be dealt with using breathing techniques including absolutely correct, authentic diaphragmatic breathing. With a little diligence and brainpower drugs are not needed. But of course, woe betide people whose lifeststyle really prohibits this. Presently I believe that a lot of good could be done if asthma drugs of the "preventer" and "reliever" type were banned. Owing to the heavy psychological pressure patients are subject to either by actual attacks or threats following a diagnosis that they may die an excruciating death at any time, they embark on life-long medication. Optimism about the future development of drugs and about minimizing side effects seems excessive.

Before modern medication was started, doctors wrote in their books that though the disease was very unpleasant, death in an attack was extremely rare. But who without further evidence is going to entertain the idea that "the cure is worse than the complaint"? Since there was far less asthma in those days, the overall situation was far better. Regards and wishing you a speedy recovery, richard friedel