While the wildfires in the USA and Canada continue to pose a direct threat to many, smoke from those fires now presents serious air quality issues in the tri-state area.
Chirag V. Shah, MD, an Atlantic Health System pulmonologist, shares eight essential tips to help protect you and your loved ones during times of unhealthy air quality.
1. Stay informed on local pollution levels >
2. Stay indoors as much as possible.
3. Avoid exercising outdoors right now (we breath 2-4x more per minute when we exercise and each breath can be more than twice as deep so we are at much higher risk inhaling large sums of particulate pollution in short periods of time ). If necessary, try exercising indoors.
4. If you have a chronic lung disease, keep your inhalers with you and stay on all your medications.
5. Close windows.
6. Use central cooling if possible.
7. Change air filters. Use air purifiers, if necessary, as indoor air quality degrades during this time.
8. Cloth masks and even standard surgical masks won't be terribly helpful for small particulate matter pollution. Try N95 masks if you have to be outdoors for sustained periods of time.
En caso de una emergencia médica, llama al 911.
