Bronchiolitis hospitalisation x7

[Whysitsohard91]

Hi, my 6.5m baby has been admitted to hospital 7 times with bronc. Every cold he gets increased work of breathing and needs oxygen for 24hr. There seems to be very little drs can do except wait for summer.. Has anyone experienced similar?

Sorry you and little one are going through this. Winter 2024 my DD was hospitalised 12 times over a 6 month period with bronchiolitis and also several bouts of pneumonia. She was 9 months old when first hospitalised. Similar situation to your little one, where she required oxygen therapy for about 24 hours except when she had pneumonia as she was much more poorly these times and required more invasive treatment. It was a similar situation where doctors said the summer would provide a circuit break to allow her to fully recover and it did. Her last hospitalisation was May 2025. They did also prescribe her symbicort, which is a combined inhaler, and she does still take this twice a day. However, the summer did provide that period she needed for her lungs to fully recover as she was just catching things back to back that winter! Hope little one recovers quickly and the summer helps!

I had this last year with my DS. He’s now 17 months. Last year he was admitted 3 times in between February-July. Each for around 5 days at a time. Since July, he was prescribed 2 inhalers and touch wood, hasn’t been admitted since. Last December he got bronch again but didn’t need admission. He is under a consultant for it but she assured me some children are just “unlucky” and he will grow out of it.
I hope you are ok, I understand how hard and worrying it is.

Not as often, but we would end up in hospital once a year with bronchiolitis/croup/viral wheeze from 6 weeks old to 7 years old. Their airways grow as they grow and for the past 3 years he’s not been admitted once.

@Beryl23 @candycanetime @lola2707 thank you all so much for your replies. I feel like I’m going crazy because no friends and family have had similar and keep coming up with theories for why it’s happening. Pray for a good summer soon!!

@Beryl23 really feel for you with the pneumonia- my 2yo son had it twice too and it was horrendous. First time in 15 years I’ve seen my husband cry :(

Not sure if the same thing but my DS had a bad case of bronchiolitis when he was 7 months and for a year and a half after that whenever he got cold there was a good chance it would go to his chest and on two occasions his cough then got so bad he needed to be admitted. He was well and with energy in between and chest always sounded clear and looked clear on X-ray. For him it was a protracted bacterial bronchitis - infection deep in the lungs that gets reactivated with viral illnesses. Diagnostic point was the cough never really went away between crises and the cure was a long course of antibiotics - 2-4 weeks and then another 2 weeks if he was still coughing at all. Good luck.