Cough Types of cough
Process of coughing Cough is defined as a short explosive expulsion of air. A cough is an important reflex that helps protect your airways and lungs. Anything from fumes, dust, smoke, pollen, medication, or having a lung disease like asthma or COPD, may activate this reflex. Your throat and airways are equipped with cough receptors as well as a thin layer of mucus that coats and protects your airways. When you inhale a trigger, your cough receptors recognize the intruder, which gets stuck in the mucus lining your airways. Those cough receptors then send a message up to your brain which sends a signal back to the muscles of your chest wall and abdomen to rapidly and forcefully take a deep breath in and out to remove the trigger. Coughing can propel air and particles out of your lungs and throat at speeds close to 50 miles per hour, and this whole process is almost instantaneous and very effective. An occasional cough is a normal, healthy function of your body. But a persistent coug