My 8mo has just been diagnosed with asthma :(

[eenybeeny]

Hi there, my 8 month old has just been diagnosed with asthma. How common is this in babies this young? Anyone have experience of how to cope with it?

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hi, my dd1 was dx with asthma at under a year old.

what has he been given?

oh she is 7 now. my 4yr old was diagnosed last week with asthma

salbutomal to start off with and if that works he will go on the brown preventor inhalor. I just cant believe it!

how is he? is he coughing or wheezing?

dd2 has an appointment this afternoon, i want her to go onto the brown inhaler. she is gettin releif from the blue one. she was very wheezey last night, and it stopped after 2 puffs on the blue.

DD was diagnosed with it when she was around a year (persistent night cough).

When she was 3.5 and the inhalers weren't proving effective, a paed consultant said it wasn't asthma, she's just a coughy sort of girl. He gave her a mega cough medicine, which knocked the night cough on the head, just like that.

When it comes to babies, asthma seems to be a bit of a catch-all term; it doesn't necessarily mean lifelong asthma. Equally, if it is asthma, the inhalers will make life a lot easier.

hth

he coughs and wheezes A LOT and a lot of times you can hear him breathing across the room there is such a loud rattle.

I'd go back and have a chat with your doctor. My dd(now 18 months) has had episodes of wheezing and coughing since about 8 months and has intermittently been prescribed a ventolin inhaler with a spacer. However, my GP (who is very up on the subject) has stated very clearly (and several GP friends have verified) that you cannot diagnose asthma in children so young - many just are wheezy when they have a virus etc. This doesn't mean they are asthmatic, and they grow out of it. Diagnosis can't be made until about 3 or 4 at the earliest, so you may be worrying unnecessarily (though obviously she'll need careful monitoring).

Hi Eeeny, I agree with what Scooby has said, doctors are reluctant to make a diagnosis of asthma in babies because apparently at this age it can be a number of things.

You know Talia has respiratory problems and she is on 10 puffs of the blue inhaler every 4 hours (planned programme which is reduced every second day) but they will not say it's asthma.

he gets especially bad at night.

The GP did tell me they cant officially label him as asthmatic but they are treating him as if he is asthmatic - I have asthma so there is a family trait.

oh dd1 was never officially dx. was told she presented as asthmatic but was too young. she is 7 now, not sure if the asthma dx is now official.

My DD (13 months) has terrible nightime coughing for weeks on end after any cold. She tends to recover for perhaps a few days before picking something else up from nursery and the cycle starts again. The GP has mentioned asthma (there's no family history) but I don't know how to alleviate her condition. We do keep her cot head elevated and try to humidify her room. Olbas oil and vaporisors seem only to make her cough worse for some reason.

eeny, my dd was given a blue inhaler last week. like scooby says, was told it is common in babies with viruses, after colds etc. dd has an awful cough at night and is very rattly and wheezy in general. like you, there is family history. my gp also said that many babies grow out of it in the first couple of years - here's hoping for them all. try not to worry.

Thanks everyone for your support. I know it will be ok I was just upset about it, you want everything to be easy for them.

hope you are feeling a bit better about it today eeny.

My Ds1 was diagnosed with asthma at around the same age eenybeeny. He is now 10 and only has to use his inhaler thru the winter months as a preventative measure, so I'm hoping that he may eventually be inhaler free.
Although with my ds2 (15mnths) who also gets very wheezy they will not say its asthma but gave him an inhaler to use at night, so times have changed I think.

Hope you and ds are doing ok