Asthma, COPD or what...?

I am a 38 year old male ex-smoker (10 yrs totaluntil since Nov 05), just under 6ft tall and fairly slim. I was diagnosed with mild asthma when I was about 8. It got better in my teens & twenties. Now not breathing well. I first felt a strange almost indescribable feeling in my chest about 3 years ago. It is a tightness and has increased. I no longer have asthmatic wheezing but a slightly laboured breathing. Have been taking ventolin 3 times a day in last week as breathing gets worse (but not in the same sort of wheezy attacks I had before or early smoking). Strangely it feels slightly better when I walk. Started to take Beclo-wottsit recently 3 times a day. I feel like i want to clear my chest of mucus but can't cough or cough anything up. The feeling is also, without a doubt, a feeling of anxiety and as it has been there 3 years plus I would like to get rid of it. When I wake up it is strange as it is not breathing but as I wake i can feel a tightness spread & this real heaviness arise around the heart area and sort of stays all day. My Doc has said depression & anxiety (and yes i feel a little anxiety but of the breathing and not surely for 3 or 4 years!). A friend's dad gave me pulmonary test in late 2003 and it read FEV1 3.75, FVC 4.41. Also PFR was 420. I think the latter is low (even though doc said it was fine) and indeed my present Doc gave me a peak flow test last week and it was 470 odd. Another blow & it was 5oosomething. Are the spirometry measurments indicative of anything?  Have i got COPD? Uncontrolled asthma? Just anxiety? Will new meds work? Ta!

[National Jewish]

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