Expectorant grugs, also known as mucokinetic drugs, refer to the medicines that can thin the sputum, reduce its viscosity and accelerate the respiratory mucosal cilia movement to improve the sputum transport function. Expectorant grugs, which can not only help to eliminate sputum and maintain airway patency, but also indirectly relieve the cough and asthma and is conducive to control infection, is an important symptomatic treatment.
Expectorant drugs are divided into:
① nausea and expectorant drugs, which can stimulate the gastric mucosa to cause mild nausea, and make bronchial glandular secretion increase through the vaginal reflex of stomach, resulting the sputum dilution easily coughed up, such as ammonium chloride , Campanulaceae, Polygalaceae, etc .;
② stimulant expectorant, which works by adding volatile substances in hot water and inhaling its vapor to stimulate the respiratory mucosa to cause mucosal congestion and moisten the respiratory tract, resulting that the sputum is easy to cough up, such as eucalyptus oil, Guaiacol;
③ sticky sputum dissolve drugs, which can change the viscous components of sputum and decrease the sputum consistency, such as acetylcysteine and so on.