I’ll try and keep it short…
From the age of 2 my DD (6) has had a cough. From the age of around 5 she has been constantly unwell. She was on antibiotics 5 times in 5 months and after a severe episode of respiratory distress they finally diagnosed her with asthma. She has had a brown and blue inhaler since being diagnosed and at our last asthma review I was happy with her medication and felt like it was working.
However, for the past few months I feel like we’ve gone back to square one. She’s been ill constantly and her attendance at school is suffering because of it. School have been really understanding but because her attendance is so low we had a meeting with one of the teachers who said they’re unable to authorise absences from now on. She is also a migraine sufferer so has had to have time off for her migraines, but the main reason she has been off has been because her asthmatic cough is keeping her awake at night or she’s developed an infection. I’ve tried helping her the best I can. I prop her head up at night and use the brown inhaler daily and the blue inhaler when she needs but I feel like the blue inhaler just really doesn’t help her much.
So I went to the gp on Friday. He is fairly new and hasn’t seen DD much, not like the other doctors have anyway. He didn’t even read her notes and when I went to the appointment I just felt like he was very dismissive with everything I said. He said I shouldn’t be giving DD her inhaler for a cough and offered to print me a list of asthma symptoms (like I don’t already know). He said because she’s never been hospitalised with respiratory distress he doesn’t think she even has asthma (even though I told him she literally saw the doctor at that surgery with respiratory distress). He referred her to the paediatrician for a “second opinion” and I left feeling really frustrated like nobody is listening. After the appointment I told the receptionist I didn’t feel like the gp was very helpful and I’d rather just see the asthma nurse instead. She booked us an appointment for next week but I’ve still got a very tired and miserable DD who can’t sleep.
So what do I do now? Do I bother with the paediatric appointment or do I just voice my concerns with the asthma nurse? DD’s teacher suggested speaking with the doctor to see if they can up her asthma meds but the gp I saw just dismissed this.