bronchiolitis and possible asthma in 9mth old

mt 9mth old little boy has had recurrent bouts of bronchiolitis since a very young age and my dr thinks its a sign he may have childhood asthma since there is a strong family history.. lately his cough is really bad (hes had another bout of bronchiolitis) and he just cant seem to shake it.. im wondering if anyone knows or has a bub thats been treated for asthma or similar at such a young age, im very concerned because you dont give anti biotics etc for bronchiolitis because it doesnt clear it up but hes really struggling with the cough =(

I have been through something very similar with boytwin. He does not have asthma, despite showing lots of signs when he was younger, as his chest problems were caused by something else (diagnosed at 13 months), but until this point he also had repeated bronchiolitis.

As for treatment, does he have an inhaler? When boytwin was having problems this did help him a lot (despite it not being asthma). Also does he sound mucousy? You could ask for a referral to a paediatric physiotherapist who can show you some tips for helping him have a more productive cough and clear his chest (postural drainage, a kind of tapping massage)

he doesnt have an inhaler as yet but im thinking he may need one.. he does sound quite mucosey as well.. thanks for the tip might see if i can get a referal..

My little boy has repeats of bronchiolitis, and the inhaler has been instrumental in allowing him to sleep. It's worth chatting with your Dr about this treatment - basically the inhaler will prevent mucus from settling in his chest and going bacterial and into bronchitis. It's scary, but worth the treatment. My little one hasn't been diagnosed with asthma yet, even though I bring up my concerns every checkup. He's now 3.

good luck for your little man.

Not many doctors will actually diagnose a child with asthma under 2, as its too hard to know for sure thats what it is. A ventolin inhaler can be prescribed for other things though. My DD1 used ventolin for her bronciolitis & DD2 & DS have used ventolin when they've had croup.
I hope he gets better soon :hug:

DD had a severe hit of respiratory infections last year, including croup, bronchiolitis both numerous times and pneuomitis (parent form of pneumonia), during one of her hospitalisations they diagnosed her with Chrinic mild asthma as she had a recurrent cough for months on end and the ventolin helped. We have since had an additional diagnosis ot atelectasis of her right lung, which is most likely due to her prematurity and there not being enough surfactant in her lung, so it isn't fully inflated. But this is something she will grow out of by about the age of 3.

They generally don't officially diagnose asthma until 2 years of age and in many situations even if it is asthma the ventolin inhalers don't necessarily work until they are older as certain parts of the respiriatory system aren't actually formed until they are a bit older and the ventolin may have little or no effect, but it wouldn't mean that asthma doesn't get diagnosed later.

I would suggest going to your GP, and getting him/him to listen to your DS chest, when he is relatively well, ie not when a bout of Brochiolitis has just hit, that way they can listen to the lungs when they are at their "best" as such. But if you mention that your DS has had a chronic cough for x months even between bouts of Brochiolitis they should do further testing. You can then look at doing a ventolin trial for a week or so.

The first ventolin trial we did with DD didn't have much of an effect, but a month later when she was admitted due to Pneumonitis it did work, until a point, then she needed supplementary O2 as well as there comes a point where the ventolin become ineffective in little one's with respiratory issues.

So definitely get some additional invesitigation done, get a ventolin trial happening, and don't feel disheartened if the ventolin doesn't work, as 9 months is quite young for it to be very effective, but I don know of some where it has worked.

Take care and I hope you get some answers, it is horrible when they are sick all the time and when their breathing is affected it can be very scary :hug:
xxoo

thanks everyone, my dr is away till next week so i will take him to another go for now and see if we can sort something out.. we are going away on the weekend and i dont want to have to find a dr while we are there if i can avoid it.. gosh its hard to see him so upset by it all the time, i really hope he grows out of it..

Growing out of it is entirely possible, sometimes those that have early onset, grow out of it as they grow bigger, and others have later onset and it hangs around longer, it is different for everyone and there are all sorts of different triggers, but once you learn what they are it can make a big difference, as well as knowing how to treat it :hug:

I've had asthma since I was a baby, it was originally thought to be croup (or maybe it started out as croup?) I dont have any advice, I just wanted to say that if it is Asthma, you'll still be ok :) My sister and I are both asthmatics and with proper meds it all turns out ok. Knowledge is power, your doing the best thing for your baby by getting it sorted early, so well done :)

saw the gp and am home with puffer spacer and mask, dr said his chest sounded wheezey so i need to give it to him every 4 hours for a couple of days and then reduce it to just before bed.. does anyone have any tips on getting a 9mth old to settle with it?

We tried lots of things to make DD feel comfortable with the puffer and spacer.

We let her play with it, so that it no longer became something scary, we let her put her face to the mask, when she was ready, and we also tried doing some puffs during her sleep.

Another one was putting it to yours or DH's faces (having to clean inbetween), showing it was ok.

Counting out aloud for each breath (they need to take in 6 breaths for all of the ventolin to be absorbed) and saying 3 more, 2 more etc as each dose was done. Congratulations for each one. And if a break is needed we give it.

It can be very distressing for them and sometimes if they are upset it can be better as they take in a deeper breath when they are crying :redface:

HTH's, it may be distressing but in time it does get easier :hug;

bit of an update, hes doing ok with it.. still tries to get it off everytime but i can usually manage to give it to him just by myself which i didnt think would be possible.. it does seem to help him when hes coughing and we are going to check it out with our regular gp on wednesday.. i think every 4 hours is a bit much tho hes only having it morning and night which is when he seems to need it..