I'm sorry you are having to deal with this. My son has pretty severe asthma... We struggled for two years with eli's asthma before we finally took him a specialist to get a good plan in place. The idea of entering another winter with him and not knowing what to do besides what we had already been doing (which was simply not working well enough, every cold would induce three weeks of coughing which could not be stopped)
So I"m going to ask a few questions and give a few recommendations. I found that the albuterol inhaler really didn't do as much as I wanted it to. When he's really having a flare, if it works at all it is only really briefly and it's very frustrating. We've definitely had to stand there with him grunting and coughing and decide whether we shoudl take him to the hospital or not. We never have because we are pretty calm about things, but I could not handle any more of that.
So, the allergist gave us steroid inhalers that have completely changed our lives. We had been giving him steroids in a nebulizer when he was sick, but it takes a long time and he is miserable about doing the nebs (we've been doing them since he was 6 months old, so the only thing he associates them with is screaming and crying). No we use the steroid inhalers two puffs in the morning, two in the evening. During a flare he gets three in the morning three in the afternoon and three in the evening for a week and we usually give him some albuterol before hand to open his airways so the steroids can get where they need to go.
This has totally changed our lives. The colds he's gotten since we've been on this plan have come with moderate coughs that last less than a week instead of three weeks. And we haven't once debated taking him to the hospital. He still has bouts induced by running etc but he self-moderates his activity level when he starts to cough etc.
RE Daycare. If he isn't actively sick (ie no fever and isn't going to get the other kids sick) I send him. Before we got on the new plan he coughed all day long, constantly, ALL THE TIME, every day. There's no way I could keep him home all the time, obvioiusly. So now I make sure he's going to be okay, they know when they should call me (if he starts grunting instead of coughing) and I used to get dirty looks, but now everyone knows he's got asthma so the kid coughs no matter what.
So, there are futher things to do if you aren't finding relief from what is being done right now. I really wish you luck. It's been pretty difficult for us, but we've stabilized mostly now and I'm so, so happy about it.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2010-04-22 11:24 am (UTC)So I"m going to ask a few questions and give a few recommendations. I found that the albuterol inhaler really didn't do as much as I wanted it to. When he's really having a flare, if it works at all it is only really briefly and it's very frustrating. We've definitely had to stand there with him grunting and coughing and decide whether we shoudl take him to the hospital or not. We never have because we are pretty calm about things, but I could not handle any more of that.
So, the allergist gave us steroid inhalers that have completely changed our lives. We had been giving him steroids in a nebulizer when he was sick, but it takes a long time and he is miserable about doing the nebs (we've been doing them since he was 6 months old, so the only thing he associates them with is screaming and crying). No we use the steroid inhalers two puffs in the morning, two in the evening. During a flare he gets three in the morning three in the afternoon and three in the evening for a week and we usually give him some albuterol before hand to open his airways so the steroids can get where they need to go.
This has totally changed our lives. The colds he's gotten since we've been on this plan have come with moderate coughs that last less than a week instead of three weeks. And we haven't once debated taking him to the hospital. He still has bouts induced by running etc but he self-moderates his activity level when he starts to cough etc.
RE Daycare. If he isn't actively sick (ie no fever and isn't going to get the other kids sick) I send him. Before we got on the new plan he coughed all day long, constantly, ALL THE TIME, every day. There's no way I could keep him home all the time, obvioiusly. So now I make sure he's going to be okay, they know when they should call me (if he starts grunting instead of coughing) and I used to get dirty looks, but now everyone knows he's got asthma so the kid coughs no matter what.
So, there are futher things to do if you aren't finding relief from what is being done right now. I really wish you luck. It's been pretty difficult for us, but we've stabilized mostly now and I'm so, so happy about it.