night time cough in 2 year old diag. as athma, need advice, please

[hazeyjane]

our 2 year old has been diagnosed as asthmatic (since she was just over a year), due to a nasty, recurrent night time cough. She has a brown inhaler morning and night and a reliever (not salbutamol, which makes her hyper).

Every time she gets ill she has a cough which can last for weeks afterwards, she always seems to have dark circles under her eyes because she sleeps so badly. At the moment she has chicken pox, and her cough is horrendous, my dh and I take it in turns to sit up with her on our lap so that she can get some sleep. But we are knackered, especially as our 1 year old also has chicken pox and is up a lot too.

Has anyone got a lo with a similar problem (the cough, not the pox!), any advice, tips, etc. I am going back to the gp when the chicken pox has gone, but he only ever says to increase the preventer and last time put her on a course of steroids. Thanks

anybody - please

hi hazeyjane
my ds3 has not yet been diagnosed with asthma (he is under 2) but following bronchiolitis when he was very little has a persistent cough and is on the brown inhaler during the winter months. We did try a short course of oral steroids last year and bloody hell, it made such a difference. Within a few days he was soooooo much better. He has been much better since and does not need the blue inhaler much anymore. Would recommend.

Hazey take her to the gp. Chicken pox can be dangerous- my son got it at 14 months and had a horrendous cough too. I went to the GP saying I know he has chicken pox but this cough is awful. He said he had pnueminitis- a bit like pneumonia but not as serious. Apparently the chicken pox caused it and he needed anti biotics to clear it up. He is asthmatic too so my advice is go today even if it is just to put your mind at rest.

hi can't comment on the chickenpox but from mumoftwo's comments it sounds worthwhile to go back to the GP.

My ds1 had a bad nighttime cough for ages, and sometimes a bad cough following exercise, and although the doctors seemed wary of giving him a concrete diagnosis of asthma, they put him on the salbutamol relievers and it made a fair bit of difference. What seemed to make more difference, however, was identifying what he is reacting to. For our ds1 he seems to react most to cold air and damp (possibly mould). So his cough was really bad in the winter when he was playing football outside. And we also bought a digital clock with a humidity monitor and found his bedroom was really humid. So we now have a dehumidifier in his bedroom. It isn't running so much now, but it's pretty much only hot dry days when we turn it off. It's amazing how much water it collects.

I'm not saying your dd is necessarily reacting to humidity but it's worth trying to work out what is going on - for other asthma sufferers it might be pollen that sets it off.

I have a couple of AsthmaUK booklets that I don't need anymore which I can post to you if you like. They are "Asthma and my child" and "Asthma in the under 5s". CAT me if you are interested.

I have also remembered that when ds1 started nursery he had a pretty bad cough, and I put off going to the GPs for a while (probably because I'd been so used to him coughing all the time) but later it turned out that he had a chest infection so I wish we'd gone earlier.

thankyou, I've just called my docors and a nurse is ringing back, she was pretty bad last night, but the humidifier seemed to improve it a bit. Her sister was also up with a cough last night, so i guess it is part of the chicken pox thing.

She had some steroids a few weeks ago, and I was amazed at how quickly she improved, but I was worried that the effect would be short lived and she would have to have course after course.

hope it all gets sorted out for you hazeyjane

Thanks mummypig (btw we are watching peppa pig pretty much non stop at the moment, I think i know every episode!).

The doctor is going to see her on thurs to review her asthma treatment, they are concerned because the inhalers don't lessen the cough in any way. I haven't got a clue what that could mean, I just hope they find a way to relieve it, it's so horrible to sit up with her at night with her coughing away.

My favourite is the one where Mummy Pig is trying to work on the computer and instead everyone ends up playing a computer game. I used to work from home so it was particularly appropriate.

I hope the review is helpful. The nighttime coughs are so worrying. Hugs to you and your dd.

Hi hazeyjane, I hope you check in on this thread again as I saw it yesterday but didn't get a chance to reply. My dd has just turned 2 and has been taking the Becotide brown inhaler since December and also has a Ventolin inhaler when needed. This followed several months of chest infections, breathing problems needing steroid tablets and nebuliser. She has a history of egg allergy and eczema. It culminated in her being hospitalised mid-December with her oxygen levels at 80%. The paed she saw diagnosed asthma and put her on the inhalers. The effect has been amazing. She has had only minor incident since December.
We saw the paed in March and he was very pleased with her progress. He said a childs cough can be caused a many things and the inhaler would only be effective if it is asthma. In your situation I would definitely ask for another opinion about the diagnosis as you don't want you dd on steroids if they are not helping. There could be another cause that needs to be investigated.
Best of luck with everything. I know how distressing it is when your little one is unwell and can't sleep.

Hi, my DS was diagnosed with prob asthma at 13 months after coughing (mostly at night) for months. It turned out that before the inhalers could control it, they needed to deal with the deep seated infection lurking behind a blocked off (with mucus) bit of lung. This took 6 weeks of antibiotics and chest physio to clear, but since then he's been doing well on Beclomethasone and Salbutamol.

Has your DD had a chest x-ray and seen a paed consultant ? Ours did a lot of tests to rule other stuff out, as well as allergy tests etc

Message withdrawn

Yes, forgot to mention dd had a chest x ray that showed up an infection that needed to be cleared first.

DS now aged 2, was on brown inhaler, and Salamol reliever, had a course of steroid tablets at one point. We took him to a homeopath and he hasn't needed his inhaler (brown or blue) or any intervention since. Before that we were taking him to hospital to be put on nebuliser as an emergency every couple of weeks. Since seeing homeopath he has gradually come off everything. Obviously if he had an asthma attack or cough I would give inhaler - I use homeopathy as a complement to conventional medicine not to replace it. My son's homeopathic regime is too complex, and is a personal prescription, so don't think it would help to post it all on here. But the main remedy for his asthma is Lobelia 6x which he takes every day. If you can afford a homeopath who specialises in children, we've found it really helpful. link to society of homeopaths with searchable database of practitioners

thanks so much for your replies.

Mummypig, I had skim read your first post, (sorry, thought the girls were distracted by tv, but dd1 was doing some wrestling moves on dd2 - there like a pair of bear cubs at the moment).I'm going to look out for a humididty monitor, because we have just moved to a pretty damp cottage, and I have been worrying about that having an effect. Our gp said to try a humidifier, but if damp is a problem then this would obviously make it worse. I'll see what the doc says, but if they are sure it is asthma, then the booklets would be great ( I can send you postage). She used to have lots of chest infections, but hasn't had one for a while - touch wood.My favourite peppa pig moment is when daddy pig gets chased by a bee whilst carrying a slice of mummy pigs strawberry cake. I would say that daddypig reminds me a lot of my dh ("I'm a bit of an expert in...."), but he is sat next to me, so i'd better watch it!

Thankyou suiledonn and cmotdibbler, I am going to ask if she can be referred to the hospital, because I'm sick of seeing lots of different doctors who all say, that I should increase the use of the inhaler.

Chequers, we have propped up the end of dd1's cot, but keeping her upright doesn't make a lot of difference. I'll definately give the honey and lemon a go, a friend recommended chamomile tea and honey, but dd1 dribbled it out of her mouth and said "yuk"!

Thanks for the link becster, I am going to look into this, because I've heard good things about homeopathy for other problems

Sorry for the long post, and once again thanks - hope all your lo's are ok.

With you on dh/daddypig . There are so many great little touches in the Peppa Pig episodes, aren't there?

The dehumidifier really made a huge difference to ds1. We haven't got round to doing anything else about the damp but might call some companies round to see if they think it is a big problem and if it can be fixed.

Another thing that I've just thought of is that we seem to have food sensitivities in the family. Dp, ds1 and I were all intolerant of cow's milk as babies. I've never had asthma but I do have rhinitis on and off. My mum is asthmatic and really believes that cow's milk products make her asthma worse. I know that conventional medics can frown on people jumping on the food sensitivities 'bandwagon'. And I do know a few people who seem to take very dodgy advice in this area, avoid huge lists of foodstuffs and end up with a really bad diet and taking loads of expensive supplements. But if your little one's life is a misery it can be worth investigating. My favourite book about food sensitivities is written by Jonathan Brostoff and Linda Gamlyn and is very informative and reasonable and grounded in science.

Let me know after the appt on Thursday if you still want the booklets. If you use the CAT feature you can send me your postal address.

p.s. I am a Neil Gaiman fan too. I have a signed copy of American Gods (I have the same name as one of the characters) and even had one of my messages answered on his blog fairly recently .

Saw the doctor today who has prescibed Singulair, to be taken daily alongside the inhaler. She was pretty sure it is asthma, but brushed aside any talk of food allergies or even trying to find out any possible causes (said not possible until they are older). She also said she would refer us to hospital if the granules didn't make a difference.

I think we are going to try to find out more about food intolerance, (will look out for the book you recommend Mummypig), because my dh has had problems in the past with wheat, and I've noticed that dd1 often looks really bloated (more than the normal toddler pot belly!), so maybe there is a link there.

Was freaked out by your Neil Gaiman comment, Mummypig, until I realised that he is on my profile! Very jealous of signed copy, I love that book, and my name is nearly a name in it too. I'm going to make a wild guess at Laura or Woden? I would love to take you up on the offer of the booklets, so I will cat you, thanks.

Hope the Singulair makes a difference and will post the booklets when I get your message.

Apologies if I appeared like a stalker... I was just excited to see NG on your profile. Of course I went to the signing before having either of my dear sons - I don't think that queuing up for ages outside Forbidden Planet fits very well with my current daily schedule . I am sure I was completely starstruck and didn't say anything particularly different or insightful. He was very pleasant though, especially given how long he'd been signing books for.

It's a shame the GP was unhelpful about looking for causes of the asthma. I tend to believe that it's better to get to the root of a problem than just treat symptoms. Anyway, I have just remembered that the food allergies and intolerance book I recommended also has some good sections on removing possible causes of asthma - including many non-food related ones. So it could be of use, whatever is giving your little one her nighttime cough.

Thinking of you

Hi hazeyjane, hope the Singulair works for your dd. It is funny how much doctors differ. When we took dd back for her check up in March the paed said he would do her RAST blood tests again to see if anything shows up now. Last time we had them done she was 14 months old and only showed an allergy to egg white which we knew about because she had a reaction previously. The paed said that by now she will have been exposed to most foods so it might be worth looking at again. I think food allergies have a lot to do with these type of problems.