Over the last year or so, every time my 5 year old gets a cold, he develops a cough that lingers. We end up needing to use the nebulizer each time, which I naively thought would be something used only on the rarest occasions. Now, the albuterol does not seem to help enough, so apparently pulmicort and albuterol will become part of the cold treatment routine. This reminds me of learning how to treat my son's eczema when he was an infant. I was reluctant to use any form of steroid, and no one explained how the steroids worked, so we struggled along, using the steroid sparingly while trying to provide him with some relief. Now, I understand that using the pulmicort will help his lungs heal from the irritation, much like how the desonide helps his skin heal from the eczema flare-ups.
I have to confess that I find it disturbing to watch my son struggle to keep up with his friends because of the coughing that always occurs. I don't hold much hope for outgrowing the peanut allergy. I suspect his numbers are too high. I am hopeful, however, that asthma will be less of a problem as he grows. I imagine many of you have been in this position or are there right now. Troubling so many children have food allergies and asthma, but there is comfort in knowing we are not alone in facing these challenges.
NOTE: Recently, I listened to a very informative show about asthma in children on Dr. Gwenn's blogtalkradio show. One of her guests was--I believe--the founder of the Allergy and Asthma Network Mothers of Asthmatics (AANMA). AANMA has a great website with a lot of helpful information and resources about asthma and allergies. I am adding it to my list of online resources.
3 comments:
Boy can I relate to this post! My daughter often suffers from asthma symptoms during seasonal allergy season. But -- good news-- she has improved as she's gotten older--she doesn't require her inhaler so often and does well on her relatively mild meds.
A recent sinus infection really irritiated her asthma symptoms and I thought we were back at square one but now she's doing great. We hadn't used an inhaler for 1-1/2 years prior to this incident!
I hope the same for your son--I've been told over and over by doctors that sometimes the kids outgrow the more severe, chronic symptoms and this has been the case for us and others we know. Good luck and Hang in there. :)
Thanks for listening to my show and for the shout out! I'd love to do another show about the experiences of parents and kids with asthma - perhaps in the fall with back to school time. Let's e-chat about it - would love help gathering up moms and kids!
Best,
Dr. G
Wow! this is a timely article. My son was just diagnosed with the same thing. Thanks for posting about this.
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