Asthma: anyone else's child gone wild on montelukast (Singulair?)

[tissy]

Dd(4) has been started on montelukast today by a paediatrician. Not entirely sure why- she was doing pretty well on Becotide inhalers, and hardly needs her blue reliever at all at the moment.

I picked her up from nursery at 2 pm for a entist appt; she has a cold, was feeling sorry for herself, and spent the rest of the afternoon sitting on the sofa, under a blanket watching TV. At 5pm, I gave her the first dose of montelukast- packet specifies to be given in the evening (why?) and an hour before or two hours after food. At 5.20 pm, she leapt up announced she wanted to play in the garden, insisted on applying sunscreen, even though it was not all that sunny and charged out there, and spent the next 40 mins running round playing with imaginary friends(she doesn't usually bother with imaginary friends) and giving me a rumnning commentary on what she and they were doing. At 6 she screamed the place down when I suggested it was dinner time, then when I finally got her to sit at the table she went through her repertoire of "action" songs at top speed. Bathtime was similarly frantic, and she has just dropped off after pretending to read her book for 15mins in pitch darkness.

I'm exhausted!


Some of the side effects of montelukast listed are irritability, restlessness, agitation, hallucination, dream abnormalities. I know most side effects aren't common, but it seems to me that this has got to be due to the drug- the only other time she has behaved remotely like this was when she had Piriton for Chicken pox!

Anyone else's child reacted like this, and did the effects last or wear off? I'm not looking forward to tomorrow's dose!

[singersgirl]

DS2 takes montelukast and has done for a couple of years. I haven't noticed any reaction at all.
How is your daughter with colourings and flavourings? I ask because the tablets are bright pink and smell very strongly of artificial cherry, as you may have noticed! DS1 is loopy today having been misguidedly allowed a FAB lolly by me yesterday. DS2 seems not to be as sensitive.