Issue Date: May 27, 2007
A child with a chronic cough? Consider asthma.
Raising three children, I've seen my share of coughing in kids. Because colds are a major cause, many folks assume all coughs are due to bugs. But asthma is another possibility.
Coughing is the body's attempt to clear things out of the chest that irritate the lungs. But sometimes coughing doesn't do the job. In a child who has asthma, the airways tighten (as the result of a bronchospasm) and produce excessive mucus. Asthma symptoms can include wheezing and shortness of breath, but some with the ailment exhibit coughing as the only symptom.
Because asthma can be dangerous if left untreated, identifying a child with asthma is crucial. Here are some clues:
The cough is chronic. Coughs are classified as either acute (lasting for one to two weeks) or chronic (more than four weeks). Most kids who cough for a week or two have been infected with a virus. But when a cough lasts several weeks, a virus is much less likely to be the cause.
It's worse at night. Coughing from infections tends to occur all day; with asthma, it can become much worse at night.
Exertion/exercise or cold weather brings on a cough. That's not usually the case with an infection.
Asthma can be triggered by any number of allergens, and identifying them can be difficult. So pay attention to the things that make your kids cough. Just a cold? Perhaps, but don't ignore the possibility that it's actually asthma.
Tedd Mitchell, M.D., president and medical director of the Cooper Clinic in Dallas, writes HealthSmart every week.
|
