antibiotics or not?

took ds to doctors today, he has had a cold but coming out of it now. he has a cough though, and is wheezey/chesty. doctor said he has a little bit of mucous in the bottom of his lungs & if it doesn't clear up in the next couple of days to take antibiotics. this makes sense, but I really didn't want to have to give them to him (i guess no parent wants to). he only had panadol/nurofen for the first time with this recent cold. his little body is not used to drugs/antibiotics. he is fine in himself, playing & smiling etc.

anyones little one had mucous on the lungs that just cleared up on its own? can I do anything to help bring it up/out? we have a vapouriser, but haven't used it since the weekend when he was really congested. am i right in thinking dry air would be better if he has mucous & that the steamy air from vapouriser would just make it worse? if you have given antibiotics, did you notice any ill effects, either immediately or months after?

I haven't got experience with chest colds, but when my Dd was 9months old she had an infected lymph gland under her arm which required hospital admission, surgery and intravenous antibiotics for 3days plus 2weeks of antibiotics at home and she had no bad effects from the antibiotics at all. (I did take probiotics hoping they would go through the breast milk).

So while I can't

Sorry dd pressed send!

Just thought to tell you I can't decide whether to use them or not, but we had strong ABs and no long term effect, hope that's reassuring xx

DD had a chest infection at 2 weeks old and had anti-biotics. She's been fine, no long-term effects that have come to show as yet *touch wood*

Hope your DS is on the mend quickly x

Same as Saffy not for a chest cold but DS had antibiotics at 3 months for a belly button infection. I gave him probiotics whilst he was on them and he was fine. He is now 6.5 months and I haven't noticed any long term effects

Thanks, ladies. Logically I know he'll be fine... I'll look in to probiotics, sounds like a good idea. : )

It doesn't sound like he felt it urgent that your DS take them. You could give it a few days and go back to check again, perhaps?
There are risks to taking antibiotics, so naturally it's best to only use them if you really need to. If your son needs them, then you use them.

thanks, onthefly. I think that sounds like a good plan. it will make me feel more comfortable giving them to him if I go back & have his chest checked again. dr was quite good, said to call/pop back in if we have any concerns or if things get worse.

How's his sleeping going?

From bad to worse unfortunately. I'm struggling to even get him to settle in his cot, let alone sleep/stay there. :-/

Boooo, my DD has hand foot and mouth disease again so her sleep went haywire too, always something. Hope he gets better and you don't need to use the antibiotics. Poor little man :-(

Thanks, Saffy. Hope your dd is feeling better soon, too. Poor little things. Xx

Ah chest colds. Yes my DS had a rather bad chest infection when he was 1 (a week in hospital with various treatments).
Since then pretty well any cold he gets goes straight to his chest.
I'm happy to live in a rather anti- antibiotic part of the world but we have had to use them a few times with DS, not much ill effects only decreased appetite for a while afterwards and sometimes a bit of an upset tummy, probiotics have generally helped and no ill-effects lasting more than a week or so after the antibiotic course finished.

Re beating it off without antibiotics: We've found raising the head of his bed really helps him to breathe better while sleeping and then clear it out on his own. You can do this either by putting a blanket under the head of the mattress or putting something under the bed legs at the head of the bed. Vaporub can help a little. Actually I think moist air with a bit of eucalyptus or vaporub helps them to get the phlegm out. I think the moist air helps open the airways in the lungs. Our DS only had trouble once he was old enough to communicate more with so we also encouraged him to cough to bring it up. You can also do a bit of chest percussion, you lay them on your lap with their head below their body and hit them on the back (lightly but firmly) with a cupped hand. It should make a good sound but you obviously don't want to hurt them. The idea is to vibrate the air in the lungs to move the mucus from the small airways to the larger ones where they can cough it up better. You start at the bottom of the lungs and move up if I remember rightly. Also look into postural drainage positions for children. I've always just done it with the head lower than the body but I just saw there are a few different positions which drain different parts of the lungs better. Apparently it's better to do the postural drainage and percussion together after time with the vaporizer.

Good luck! I hope your DS recovers quickly and doesn't need the antibiotics.

thanks for your post, nyigi. : )

I've had his cot raised at one end since the weekend, although he hasn't been spending much time in there atm. :-/
I'll look at the postural drainage too, he coughs it up but swallows it again straight away. I bought some probiotics today too, so fingers crossed he makes a swift turnaround & I can avoid the AB's.