To be so fed up and let down by medical professionals? Any help out there? Child cough.

[Hoppyhops]

Hi, does anyone have any advice? DS (20 months) has been back and fore to the GPs and A&E for croup and coughs since he turned 1 in July. It never ends and he can’t go 2 weeks without being well.

He’s been given Dex steroids at a&e numerous times for stridour attacks in the night- then I was given some to administer at home by the GP. He’s just had his second dose in 2 weeks. Constantly told by GP that it’s viral/upper respiratory infections, but no help given to support us to get him better.

We were once told it could be hay fever, so we’ve been giving piriton everyday since last September. He had a blue inhaler given once- it does nothing. At one point tonsillitis was making it worse so he had antibiotics and the tonsillitis cleared up but the cough never went away.

He coughs through every single night and every morning he wakes at 5.30 with a hacking cough, as if clearing all his chest. When he’s ‘well’, he clears it and it doesn’t come back until nap time. When he’s got a cold, he never clears it and just coughs every 10-30 seconds through the day.

AIBU to be so fed up of this and feel like we should be getting more out of the GP? It can’t be normal and I just hate being told ‘they catch a lot of illnesss’ - yes, they do, I have another child and I know this - but DS has CONSTANTLY got a cough. It’s so cruel watching him hack his lungs up every morning.

I had the same OP. I got fed up of calling the ambulance when my child would cough so much that he’d struggle to breathe and soil themselves and vomit everywhere. I’ll never forget how their face used to turn blue and their bulging eyes. After having their adenoids removed, we still have coughs but nowhere near the intensity of what they used to be. Definitely get their adenoids checks- especially if they’re snorers or breathing through their mouth at night. Also, mine has a dust mite allergy to remove lots of soft furnishings from their room and get an air purifier.

Any damp or mould? Have you throughly checked his room? Maybe there’s mould in his mattress from any spilt drinks or nappy accidents.
I have heard of this being a cause before.

If that’s all ok I would be thinking of allergies.

Once he had to have adrenaline in hospital which helped but he still wasn't 100% so they gave him nebulized budesonide, which he responded very well too. Then they sent us home with the inhaler and it's been on repeat prescription since.

Sorry if this has already been said OP, but this does sound like asthma and I wonder if you were shown properly how to use the inhalers? I have adult-onset asthma and found my inhalers prescribed by my GP weren't helping much. The Asthma nurse asked me to show her how I was taking them and she told me I needed to be using a spacer to ensure I was actually taking in enough of the medicine - without a spacer much of it is lost hence why they weren't working. Since using my spacer my asthma is much more controlled.

This video shows how to use it - you can buy spacers on Amazon.

Definitely worth a try 😊

As another adenoid data point, my son didn't have the same symptoms but he did have ear infections constantly as a baby, plus constant green snot. It was only because he went to a consultant who checked him over and went 'it's the adenoids constantly being infected that's triggering everything else' (paraphrasing) that he got them out - and was much better after that point.

I don't know much about asthma and that does sound more likely, reading the thread, but it would also be good to get an ENT person to look at him.

Thanks again, everyone. Just had another read through and I’ll start on environmental factors/diet/air purifier, as well as querying asthma and inhalers. Thanks to the poster who also posted about inhaler technique. If no luck, we have other things to look into now too. I’m feeling slightly more sane now I have a plan. Mumsnet is great.

OP I've only read your posts so not sure if this has been mentioned, but our frequently wheezy, always sick and coughing kid has seen a massive improvement with daily montelukast. GPs aren't always the best with paediatric issues, and this was recommended by children's a&e and then later by the wheeze clinic we were referred to.

You can't have an inhaler 'technique' with a 20 month old. A spacer can help, but the only way to be sure the medication gets in is via a nebuliser.

Hi OP, did you ever get to the bottom of this? Going through similar with my little one

Hi,
I’m sorry to say but we haven’t got to the bottom of it. However, there has been an improvement. He’s 2.5 and, when he’s ill, he has a persistent cough for weeks- worse outside in the cold or when he does exercise/- but we do have much longer periods of respite that before.
Back in May, he ended up back on antibiotics and I changed his antihistamine from piriton to piriteze (stronger, I believe - the 2+ version) and that cleared it up for a few months, which was amazing after 11 months of the persistent cough.
He takes piriteze twice a day and is really dribbly and snobby when he doesn’t have it - it’s extremely noticeable.
We’ve only given Dex steroids once so far this winter which, again, is a vast improvement on last year. He is still so much more chesty than my other DS though so I do think he’ll end up being assessed for asthma but nobody is prepared to even discuss that with us still.
Sorry it’s not more helpful- I know how tough it is when you’re in the depths of it all.

It's awful op and yes could be other allergens as well can you ask for a test.
Apprently your within your rights to also ask for different opinions and see different docs.

Ps how did the denhunidfter get mouldy ?

Can you get an air pueifyer ?

Another one here whose child’s constant winter coughs were only sorted once we got her tonsils and adenoids out age 4

She also had sleep apnoea and on off glue ear

I would be pressing for a referral to an ENT although tbh we had to go private

Thanks both - we just keep getting it noted and pushing. Thankfully, it’s been less awful this winter but that cough still comes back every now and then. We’ve essentially learned how to manage everything ourselves and found what works for us. There have been fewer A&E trips, thankfully! But, as I said, we still haven’t really got to the bottom of it and I suspect we’ll be dealing with it for a while.
(It was a humidifier not dehumidifier- so it just kept getting mouldy in the water inlet.