6. Asthma
In the most severe and chronic cases, the lung disease that is asthma can cause fainting. Asthma is a serious problem with more than 10 Americans dying from it each day. The truly tragic part is that only one-third of asthma patients die in hospital, meaning the rest are not being adequately treated or not raising worsening symptoms with family and doctors. Asthma deaths are preventable so you should never ignore an asthma patient who complains of chest tightness.
The precursor to dying from asthma is fainting or dizzy spells. Never ignore these and assume it was a one-off, bad occurrence. Almost 85 percent of those who die from asthma develop progressive symptoms ranging in duration from 12 hours to several weeks before death. Under one-fifth of people die in under 6 hours of reporting severe symptoms. Always rush such a person to the nearest trauma hospital unit and never assume that medication will open the constricted airways enough.