Personal Narrative: My Search

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My search took about three weeks. I began my research by doing some background reading in the Encarta online encyclopedia. That site provided a definition of the term asthma, information on how the lungs function, the causes of asthma attacks, and the diagnosis and treatment of the disease. Statistics on the number of Americans with the disease were included in the article. Most of the information, including the statistics was supported by the information in the Merck Manual of Medical Information.
From there I did an online search combining the terms asthma and managing in the Google search engine. Of the many sites that were available, I chose to use the American Lung Association’s web site. There the information on asthma was current, …show more content…

Davis referred me to an allergy / asthma specialist named Dr. Emma Anders. Since she was going to treat my asthma, I decided to interview her for my paper. I forgot to take her busy schedule into account, and I did not know that she had planned a short vacation during the time I was doing my research. She graciously agreed to meet with me after her office hours one day. Dr. Anders was a great source of information on all aspects of my disease, but the most unique feature of our interview included a demonstration of two instruments, a peak flow meter and a metered-dose inhaler. She also sent home a video on the appropriate use of both pieces of …show more content…

Our librarian showed me how to use the “Browse Topics” feature. This feature allowed me to find the search terms used by Proquest and to narrow my search. I found asthma listed as a search term with 111 subtopics. I narrowed my search by adding the subtopic athletes to one of my searches and allergies to another.
At the public library I searched the OPAC (Online Public Access Catalog) using asthma as the search term in a subject search. Surprisingly, many of the titles shown in the catalog were checked out. I didn’t want to place any titles from other libraries on hold, so I checked out 1 of the 2 titles on the shelf. The book, Breathe Right Now: A Comprehensive Guide to Understanding and Treating the Most Common Breathing Disorders, was much longer that I had anticipated. Consequently, I read only some of the chapters.
By the end of the third week, I felt I had plenty of information. My original search question remained the same: Can I manage my asthma? I was able to define exactly what it was that I wanted to manage. I ended up narrowing my topic to three areas I had to deal with in order to manage my asthma: medications, sports/exercise, and environmental

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