Mums of children with asthma - please could you give me some advice on DS2 again!

[Saturn74]

DS2 has been hospitalised with a viral wheeze twice since last October.

We think it is related to the pollen/oil seed rape.

His peak flow is usually 290.

It has been dropping for about 24 hours, and is now 150.

He has had his two daily doses of steroids, and is currently taking ventolin every two hours.

Do I need to get him to the GPs for a nebuliser now, or would you wait a while?

Any help gratefully received.

He's 9 by the way, and happily sat watching a DVD as I type.
But coughing a lot, and wheezing a bit.

My two have allergenic asthma, so I give them Piriton or Zyrtec, whichever is at hand. Also I've found that I can't dry ds2's sheets outside when he's bad because it makes it worse. He does best when they're tumble dried or if that's not an option, then dried inside.

Also baths and lots of nose blowing and face washing to get the pollen off.

But but but, I think you should take him to the GP now as all that's for when it's not so bad. Sounds like you're at the limit of what you can do at home without another visit and he's getting worse. Good luck and hope you don't have a long wait.

Not sure why I even wrote the first two paragraphs! Ignore them at will.

Hope he feels better after the GP visit.

If you get 2 hours out of the inhaler, then that is probably fine. My GP said anything less than two hours, take DD to the hospital (this was when DD was 2 ish).

Having cut it very fine a couple of times, including arriving at A&E with an unconcious child, I'd say go sooner rather than later. It is much easier to treat if the Sats don't go too low.

Thank you both for your advice.
Forgot to mention that he has also had antihistamine this morning.
I am waiting for the GP's surgery to call me back, as there is no-one available to see him at the mo.
Will keep fingers crossed for an appointment.

They just called back with an appointment for 4pm, so all should be well.

Oh, yay, good. I was just about to post asking you to let us know. A sigh of relief on your behalf and hope he's feeling better soon.

Thank you.
Am off to prize him off the sofa.

The nebuliser didn't really help.
So he has to have prednisolone and hourly inhalers and hope it gets better.

Oh poor thing. Good luck tonight. It's thundering and lightening-ing here; hope you don't get it.

I suffer from very bad airbourne allergies. The last few months with the pollen and hay fever I have been finding it very difficult to breath at night. Most nights I wheeze until I give in and use my ventolin inhaler. I seemed to be using it more and more. I then read about a gadget (in the Daily Mail) called my air zone. It is a small ioniser.I bought one about a month ago and have only used my inhaler once since. The web site is www.myairzone.com and I bought mine from a company called www.healthwholesaledirect.co.uk. It is about £90 so expensive but in my case worth it. It is apparently recommended by BUPA and is used in hospitals. Would be interested if anyone else has tried it.

Humphrey how is he now/Hope all is well.Ds is also asthmatic and takes piriton every 4hrs.The asthma nurse said to us both that the pollen is quite bad lately and put me on cetirizine.My asthma has been better but am unsure wether or not you could get an anti-histamine thats stronger for your ds2 because of age.Might be worth speaking to doc about it

Apologies for missed ?

Thank you for all your comments and best wishes.
We will certainly look at that website, Lolski, as we were talking about getting an ioniser this morning.
He is holding his own a bit better today, but his peak flow is still very low - so we will be off to the hospital if it drops any further, as we have nothing else to throw at the asthma if all this doesn't work.
The steroids make him rather hyper-active, and the lactose in the anti-histamines irritate his dairy intolerance - he was bouncing off the walls until about 11pm last night.

I hope he gets better soon. I don't know whether it is just a coincidence that I have improved or the ioniser is working but it's worth a try as it doesn't have any health risks. Not long before I got it I also changed another couple of things. I stopped opening all windows upstairs in the house and banned our cat from wandering in and out of the bedroom. I think that it has probably all helped. Has your DS got hypo allergenic bedding. I know that this can make a huge difference as well.