Question

My daughter is over 4 years old and has had recurrent respiratory infections (bronchitis, pneumonia) since January 2006. She has been suffering from persistent coughing ever since. A specialist doctor diagnosed her with allergic cough and she has been taking Xanthum and Sularin. Since July this year, she has been treated with traditional Chinese medicine, with her coughing symptoms appearing intermittently. She tends to cough more during changes in weather, and there have been a few instances where her lungs produced wheezing sounds. In October, she was again prescribed Xanthum and Sularin. She usually doesn’t cough, but has experienced 2-3 episodes of coughing with wheezing. The most recent episode was on November 27th, when she received medication for asthma via nebulization inhalation treatment, which quickly relieved her symptoms. I would like to ask the experts, has my daughter’s condition already developed into asthma? What treatment should be considered?

Answer

Allergic cough is a form of asthma, and the current treatment is correct.