Hearing how your child coughs, before you start to worry and try to drown out a frightening symptom with all kinds of drugs, remember: a chest cough in children appears when there is something in the body that causes it. Therefore, it is always necessary to fight not with a symptom, but with a disease provoking it.
There are not so many cases when a cough is dangerous. Let's look at them, to begin with understanding what this phenomenon is.
What is a cough?
A cough is a sharp exhalation with which the body gets rid of mucus. And mucus, in turn, is secreted in order to cleanse the bronchi and neutralize the bacteria and viruses that cause the inflammatory process. Used mucus is eliminated by coughing.
But did something make her stand out? This is where it becomes necessary to contact a pediatrician. Breast cough in children is not potassium cyanide poisoning , it is quite possible to wait until the doctor arrives and his diagnosis. Therefore, do not rush to treat a cough, after listening to the advice of a friend. You render the child’s body a “bear service”.
How to treat cough in children
In a home medicine cabinet you need to have effective and harmless cough suppressants for children: Bromhexine, Mukaltin, Lazolvan, ammonia anise drops, Acetylcysteine. But! Do not immediately try to feed all this wealth of a coughing child. Perhaps it’s enough just to moisten the air in the room so that the tearing dry cough stops. Or maybe you need to remove a wool blanket or flowers that cause allergies.
When a cough becomes dangerous
The nature of the cough can determine the causes that caused it. Listen, if the child is barking, dry and loud, then this is a symptom of inflammation of the larynx or trachea. And convulsive, reaching to vomiting - a sign of whooping cough. Bronchial asthma is accompanied by a cough on the background of wheezing. If there is blood in the sputum produced by coughing, then this alarming symptom indicates the possibility of pulmonary tuberculosis. Remember, chest cough in children becomes dangerous if:
- he appeared suddenly and does not stop in any way;
- occurs at night, in fits;
- accompanied by wheezing, audible without a phonendoscope;
- coughing bleeds;
- cough took a protracted form (lasts more than 3 weeks).
All this is the reason for immediate medical attention and requires a thorough examination of the child by specialists.
How to help your child with a strong cough
If your baby suddenly coughed violently while eating or playing, the most natural attempt will be for your parents to make sure that a small foreign body has not got into his airways. Tap the child on the back, give a drink of water. But if after this incident the child has a common cold, and even pneumonia occurs, then be sure to conduct an examination to exclude the risk of something getting stuck in the airways.
In other cases, during treatment, remember that not only medications prescribed by your doctor can relieve a painful chest cough in children, but also regular humidification of the air in the room, airing the rooms, and increasing the amount of fluid that the child should drink. All this will help sputum liquefy, it is easier to go away and, accordingly, cough will become less frequent, more productive and completely non-dangerous.
Be healthy!