My doctor told me that Asthma and Reactive Airway Disease are both the same thing. Your description of “tightness” sounds like Asthma to me.

I had trouble finding a corticosteroid that worked for me too. Most of them made me feel like I had cotton in my lungs caused me to hack and cough. Advair was the one that finally worked for me. Just to correct Tichtou, Advair does not contain albuterol which is a short acting beta agonist. It contains a long acting beta agonist called salmeterol (Serevent). I use Advair twice a day, when I get up and when I go to bed, so it's easy to remember when to take it. I also have albuterol as my rescue inhaler.

You might want to look into allergy testing or the use of another pill called Singulair. My dad has COPD and his doctor gave her a nebulizer, but he hated it. So, they tried to give him a portable nebulizer and he refused to use it too. So, he switched to Spiriva. It seems to be working well for him. I think it's the same line of drug as Advair.

I totally sympathize about taking so many drugs. Between my medications for my asthma, hypertension, hypothyroidism, GERD, rheumatoid arthritis, allergies, and restless leg syndrome my medicine cabinet is pretty full!

I hope you find something that works for you soon.

[QUOTE]"the steroid goes straight to the lungs and is not distributed throughout the whole body, like an oral steroid. So the steroid goes only where it is needed"
What you quoted is right. It really has to do with the amount and how it is administed. Yes it is a steriod and it can have side effects, they are just way less than an oral steroid.

As for not listing any side effects, there is a Federal "Black Box" warning on Advair, espically for people with asthma. One of the componets, Serevent, has been know to cause a worsing of asthma symptoms and could result in death. They usually rattle the warning off at 100 miles an hour at the end of the commercial. It is possible that they don't list the serevent warning the COPD commercials as it is more related to people with asthma. I've also heard that the FDA has listed Advair as a drug that should only be used to contol your asthma if it is not well controlled on other medications.

I've only had asthma for a little over 2 years and have been on advair the whole time (plus a dozen or so others as we tried to figure out what worked for me. I'm currently on Advair 250/50 2x/day, Spiriva 1x, Claritn (OTC) 1x day, and ProventilHFA as needed.