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COUGH COLD ASTHMA : RECURRENT RESPIRATORY SYMPTOMS IN CHILDREN:
UNDERSTANDING AND THEN MANAGING.. IS THE ONLY PERMANENT SOLUTION This Page will help you understand reasons behind reepeated cough and asthma or repeated cold or wheeze in children. A Recurrent Respiratory Clinic is run for the same by Dr Kondekar at Mumbai. You may find details at www.breathingdiary.com Dr Kondekar is also available for private consultation in Mumbai, send a sms with child age reason for visit and selected date and time of consultation, Visit www.doctorchild.com for clinic address. All coughs are not same, some have problem in nose, some have issues with airways and some due to pneumonia or TB. Dr Kondekar will be able to help you understand which one is which, and why all coughs are not asthma even though they may have some relief with asthma like medicines. For details ask. See a cough flow chart available in parent/patient section of www.breathingdiary.com |
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Updated Today: ASTHMA IS A DIAGNOSIS BY EXCLUSION OF OTHER DISEASES |
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recurrent cough and cold, are you worried of asthma or allergy?
ask Child health specialist pediatrician Mumbai....
what is cough, cold and wheeze?
Many parents and people have weird ideas about cough, cold and wheeze.These interpretation are based on their knowledge, info, myths and perceptions. its better to be clean on these terms when we proceed to discuss further.
Cough: is an explosive sound when air comes out of mouth with a force. noises from nose, chest, throat during breathing is not cough. "Kaff" (in Ayurveda means a lot different than the word "cough". Cough is of different types and varieties, that may help a doctor assess its severity and origin and accordingly plan a therapy.
Cold: Ice is cold, when fever settles hands and feet may go cold. so cold is a very common word used for many issues. When meeting a doctor regarding respiratory issues, we will consider cold as "common cold". The word "common Cold" is used for symptoms of nose and throat with or without fever. Literally its synonymous with flu.But describing this doesnt help a doctor much to understand the problem. So for all practical purposes we will call cold as runny nose/running nose/stuffy nose/sneezing/watering nose etc. Describing specifically will help doctor plan a specific therapy. cold often may be followed by cough and may be associated with noisy breathing and at times mouth breathing. Read and understand each word carefully.
Wheezing: its a musical like sound, little longer and high pitch (softer), may be felt by hand on chest or heard aloud at times with child visibly distressed. It is different from noisy breathing which is mainly a sound like snorring or stridor which is louder, and low pitch. Doctor's precision may be needed to separate them. often wheeze is a late sign in asthma , though it has many reasons not related to asthma.
Recurrent cough/ cold/wheeze?
Many parents often feel that their child gets repeated cough cold wheeze etc. Often this may be biased if both parents are working. For example if a child coughs every night and if the parent comes home only at night, while informing the doctor parent may tell he is coughing all the time. This may affect diagnosis and therapy in a great way. Children below 3 year age in India and developing countries, get exposed to a number of respiratory viruses and pollution too. its normal for a child to have 4-8 episodes/year of respiratory issues in infants upto 2 years age. If it is more than 8 per year in first 2 years or more than 3 per year after 2 year age, its likely that this will be called "recurrent".
Recurrent doesnt always mean serious. Serious ones are those that last longer than 7 days, recurr within a gap of 2 weeks and may be life threatening ( see danger symptoms) and may affect weight gain and growth. Serious respiratory symptoms when recurrent (3 per year at any age) may need to be evaluated for associated congenital heart defects.
All these symptoms may be individual or together, with or without fever. Infections often come with fever, allergy / asthma like diseases often come without fever. Occasionally there may be overlap.
Allergy / Asthma is difficult to define below 2 years age, its difficult to prove till 6 years age.
Therapy in both groups is primarily symptomatic.Fever medicines for fever, decongestants for runny nose, bronchodilators for wheezers, cough syrups (bronchodilator or suppressive) for cough.
Evaluations / investigations are supportive. Infections may need antibiotics at times, while Allergy / Asthma may need steroids at times.
lets discuss one by one in details. Treatment of runny nose is already discusssed.www.breathingdiary.com click for access.
Day in and day out, Pediatricians see a lot of patients including children who have repeated, persistant respiratory symptoms. The symptoms may vary from sneezing, runny nose, cough to frequent nose blocks, throat discomfort, breathlessness, wheezing and severe breathing failure with cyanosis.
Join for free SMS tips.send a sms JOIN Breathingclinic to 567678
At times there are serious elements that can be completely(to a great extent) cured once diagnosis is made, like say tonsilloadenoditis, foreign body in airways or nose,infections like TB, pneumonia or HIV.
Damage to airway in newborn period, congenital heart diseases, advanced TB infection of lungs, and many others may not have easy cure.
Major chunk of these cases, donot have any clue or findings related to any of above mentioned diseases, UIn such cases most doctors are compelled to make the diagnosis of allergy, asthma, allergic rhinitis , reactive airway disease etc
Whatever name we may give to these group of diseases, When there is no obvious treatable reason or otherwise, The therapy in such cases may last longer, frustrating and even with side effects.
In all such cases, the supportive therapy is mainly targeted at reduction and elimination of symptoms by groups of medicines that act locally (inhalation therapy) and help in acute and long term issues both.
These cases are classified in severity depending on severity of discomfort , especially in night or early morning, quality of life, weight loss, exact frequency and episodic nature or seasonality of symptoms, apart from possible method of allergen elimination.
A detailed daily charting of symptoms if any for a period of month will help doctor classify the severity and thus modify the drug types and doses.
These charting are made easy by easy to chart "breathing diary". Its just a one page diary with headings and patients are supposed to chart every bedtime. So easy and simple, that doctors can easily teach patients how to treat such issues at home to a great extent. Helping managing asthma at home, is now possible with these breathing diary.
ask Child health specialist pediatrician Mumbai....
what is cough, cold and wheeze?
Many parents and people have weird ideas about cough, cold and wheeze.These interpretation are based on their knowledge, info, myths and perceptions. its better to be clean on these terms when we proceed to discuss further.
Cough: is an explosive sound when air comes out of mouth with a force. noises from nose, chest, throat during breathing is not cough. "Kaff" (in Ayurveda means a lot different than the word "cough". Cough is of different types and varieties, that may help a doctor assess its severity and origin and accordingly plan a therapy.
Cold: Ice is cold, when fever settles hands and feet may go cold. so cold is a very common word used for many issues. When meeting a doctor regarding respiratory issues, we will consider cold as "common cold". The word "common Cold" is used for symptoms of nose and throat with or without fever. Literally its synonymous with flu.But describing this doesnt help a doctor much to understand the problem. So for all practical purposes we will call cold as runny nose/running nose/stuffy nose/sneezing/watering nose etc. Describing specifically will help doctor plan a specific therapy. cold often may be followed by cough and may be associated with noisy breathing and at times mouth breathing. Read and understand each word carefully.
Wheezing: its a musical like sound, little longer and high pitch (softer), may be felt by hand on chest or heard aloud at times with child visibly distressed. It is different from noisy breathing which is mainly a sound like snorring or stridor which is louder, and low pitch. Doctor's precision may be needed to separate them. often wheeze is a late sign in asthma , though it has many reasons not related to asthma.
Recurrent cough/ cold/wheeze?
Many parents often feel that their child gets repeated cough cold wheeze etc. Often this may be biased if both parents are working. For example if a child coughs every night and if the parent comes home only at night, while informing the doctor parent may tell he is coughing all the time. This may affect diagnosis and therapy in a great way. Children below 3 year age in India and developing countries, get exposed to a number of respiratory viruses and pollution too. its normal for a child to have 4-8 episodes/year of respiratory issues in infants upto 2 years age. If it is more than 8 per year in first 2 years or more than 3 per year after 2 year age, its likely that this will be called "recurrent".
Recurrent doesnt always mean serious. Serious ones are those that last longer than 7 days, recurr within a gap of 2 weeks and may be life threatening ( see danger symptoms) and may affect weight gain and growth. Serious respiratory symptoms when recurrent (3 per year at any age) may need to be evaluated for associated congenital heart defects.
All these symptoms may be individual or together, with or without fever. Infections often come with fever, allergy / asthma like diseases often come without fever. Occasionally there may be overlap.
Allergy / Asthma is difficult to define below 2 years age, its difficult to prove till 6 years age.
Therapy in both groups is primarily symptomatic.Fever medicines for fever, decongestants for runny nose, bronchodilators for wheezers, cough syrups (bronchodilator or suppressive) for cough.
Evaluations / investigations are supportive. Infections may need antibiotics at times, while Allergy / Asthma may need steroids at times.
lets discuss one by one in details. Treatment of runny nose is already discusssed.www.breathingdiary.com click for access.
Day in and day out, Pediatricians see a lot of patients including children who have repeated, persistant respiratory symptoms. The symptoms may vary from sneezing, runny nose, cough to frequent nose blocks, throat discomfort, breathlessness, wheezing and severe breathing failure with cyanosis.
Join for free SMS tips.send a sms JOIN Breathingclinic to 567678
At times there are serious elements that can be completely(to a great extent) cured once diagnosis is made, like say tonsilloadenoditis, foreign body in airways or nose,infections like TB, pneumonia or HIV.
Damage to airway in newborn period, congenital heart diseases, advanced TB infection of lungs, and many others may not have easy cure.
Major chunk of these cases, donot have any clue or findings related to any of above mentioned diseases, UIn such cases most doctors are compelled to make the diagnosis of allergy, asthma, allergic rhinitis , reactive airway disease etc
Whatever name we may give to these group of diseases, When there is no obvious treatable reason or otherwise, The therapy in such cases may last longer, frustrating and even with side effects.
In all such cases, the supportive therapy is mainly targeted at reduction and elimination of symptoms by groups of medicines that act locally (inhalation therapy) and help in acute and long term issues both.
These cases are classified in severity depending on severity of discomfort , especially in night or early morning, quality of life, weight loss, exact frequency and episodic nature or seasonality of symptoms, apart from possible method of allergen elimination.
A detailed daily charting of symptoms if any for a period of month will help doctor classify the severity and thus modify the drug types and doses.
These charting are made easy by easy to chart "breathing diary". Its just a one page diary with headings and patients are supposed to chart every bedtime. So easy and simple, that doctors can easily teach patients how to treat such issues at home to a great extent. Helping managing asthma at home, is now possible with these breathing diary.
