Clenil get any worse?

Woah.

So that joke was bad even for me.

But hey!

I went back to the nurse a week-and-a-half ago, for a spirometry (test to see how my lungs are working) which was scheduled..6 weeks beforehand.

Basically, I was half-diagnosed with possible-maybe-ish mild intermittent asthma back in September 2013. Spirometry then and in the following January were fine and I was given a Ventolin and sent on my way. It was fine for a few months and worked when I needed it.

Then, I started to find I was needing it more. Then it became less and less and less effective to the point where I was using about 5 puffs a day. So I went back to my doctor and got a spacer and scheduled a spirometry for me.

I started to feel it was less effective even with the spacer. I started to wheeze audibly at night, and more and more I have struggled to get air over the past few months. It was originally just sporadic, occasional. But for a few months it has been constant, worsening. I developed a chronic cough, which worsened considerably in the few weeks between my appointment and my spirometry.

The nurse heard my cough, and I did the spirometry, and my FEV-1 was 2.17 which is bad for a singer (our % should be greater than 100% of predicted flow, mine was 70%) and it kept dropping each time I tried it.

We talked for a bit, she listened to my lungs, and said she wanted to try me on a steroid inhaler and we would review my lung function in 6 weeks (now 4.5 weeks), so she wrote me the prescription.

Went to pharmacy to get it filled and it seemed like things were going ok.

And then there was the spacer.

I started to notice that there was a bit of mist coming out of the top of the spacer when I sprayed in the Clenil Modulite (my new inhaler). It kept happening, so they gave me a new spacer, but it was happening with that, too. Now they've given me an AeroChamber for now, while they chat to the manufacturers to make sure it was just a little defect. It wasn't a huge loss, but it probably shouldn't have been happening. Sad, I liked my old spacer :-(

It seems to be working, but I'm getting these little 'drops' between my morning and night doses. I take 200 mcg at 7:00 in the morning (two puffs) and the same at 10:00 at night (medium dosage) and it works for a few hours, but around about 5:00 in the evening, it stops working..I'm going to talk to the nurse about that next time I see her unless it gets worse, in which case I'll see what the pharmacist says, and go from there.

So, new puffer enters the house. Will this new brand, Chiesi, live up to the expectations of more consolidated brands like GSK (Ventolin, Flixotide etc.)?

We'll have to see.

~Liz