Can a 3 year old be tested for asthma?

[Mrsdoodle]

Hi,
DS is 3 and has had problems on and off with breathing. When he was 12 months he got a nasty chest infection and ended up in A&E because he was struggling to breathe. He was given a ventolin inhaler afterwards which we used regularly at night through that winter as he was almost constantly unwell with colds. He was fine during the day and all through the summer.

The following winter, when he was 2, we continued to use the ventolin inhaler but I felt that it wasn't working as well. He would often be awake at night for 2-3 hours and seemed to be struggling to catch his breath and breathing quickly / fast heart rate even with the ventolin, though he was not audibly wheezing. The GP gave him a brown preventative inhaler in the spring but by then he was getting over his winter breathing problems in any event.

This winter I have had him on the brown inhaler again, but I'm not really sure he needs it. He has constant colds and sometimes wakes in the night breathing quickly and complaining he can't breathe, but it could just be because he has a blocked nose - he doesn't wheeze. He does struggle with walking up hills and becomes very out of breath after running.

What I don't really understand from the GP, is whether he has 'asthma' and if so whether he should just remain on the brown preventative inhaler generally (which he dislikes and the GP said may have long term side effects), or whether there are some children who just struggle a bit through the winter colds season with their breathing and therefore maybe I should just stick with ventolin as and when. Is there a test a 3 year old can take to see whether they have asthma? My GP seemed to think he has to wait until he's 5 to be tested.

Any advice very gratefully received!

Is the brown one Clenil modulate?

My experience is very similar to yours. Doubtful of the diagnosis. Night cough and breathlessness linked to colds and not much else. My YD is 10 now and when she was 8 I took her off the clenil for 6 weeks to see what would happen. I think that the effects had been so subtle to begin with that I didn't realise how much benefit she was getting (a bit like the first time you give a floppy toddler a dose of calpol and they are suddenly bright eyed and bushy tailed). She deteriorated quite badly within the 6 weeks and we had night cough almost every night, which affected her sleeping, which affected her school work. etc etc.

If you need clarification go back to the GP, but do not withdraw prescribed meds unilaterally. it's too dangerous. Ventolin worse for you than low dose topical steroids FWIW. Steroids can affect you long term (not much evidence of problems with clenil/becotide though) but asthma can kill really quickly.

Hi, thanks very much for the responses. Yes the brown one is called Clenil. That's very interesting because I think my son seems a bit worse when I took him off the Clenil for a bit, but it's quite subtle and hard to distinguish from general cold symptoms.

I have pressed various GPs quite a bit, but they all seem to say slightly different things. I feel rather as though the Clenil inhaler was prescribed last year because I asked for something more than the ventolin which at the time was inadequate, but this year I've hardly used the ventolin at all and the Clenil was only prescribed again because of me reporting ongoing though less severe breathing difficulties. It's difficult to be sure now whether the breathing difficulties he has are really asthma-related or just being constantly bunged up and having a cough.

I will go back to the doctor (again), and very interesting what you say about ventolin being worse than low dose steroids. I have asked this several times but was told to give him as much as I like.

Thanks again