How many days should a child's cough go away?

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Green Elena Stanislavovna

Otolaryngologist of the second category

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It happens that cough in children, even with proper therapy, does not cease to bother and becomes protracted. Parents should under no circumstances leave this to chance: they should immediately consult a doctor, continue the course of treatment and undergo additional research.

What is a persistent cough in a child? Doctors identify this problem if a child’s cough lasts 3 weeks and does not go away even with proper therapy. Immediately after this period has expired, you must visit a specialist to confirm the diagnosis.

Why doesn't my child's cough go away?

As a rule, this is quite normal if the child still has a cough and no fever for about three to four weeks after the cold. The main and most important condition is not to stop treatment. If it is not effective due to any difficulties or other reasons, you need to consult a doctor.

The protective reflex of the human body as a cough manifests itself in response to a wide variety of microirritants or allergens, as well as foreign bodies. There are two main types of cough: physiological and pathological. A physiological cough is distinguished by its natural origin: in this way, the respiratory organs are freed from secretions, saliva, food particles, and so on. A pathological type of cough occurs as a symptom of the progression of an infectious disease or allergy.

The nerve endings that provoke the cough reflex are not only located in the respiratory organs. Receptors are also located in the esophagus, diaphragm and gastric mucosa. Based on this, the reason why the child has a lingering cough should be determined.

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Causes of prolonged cough:

· exacerbation after prolonged acute respiratory viral infections;

· whooping cough, parawhooping cough;

· diseases of the respiratory tract and organs (inflammation of the trachea and larynx, sinusitis, pharyngitis, pneumonia, bronchitis, tonsillitis, tuberculosis);

· infectious diseases caused by parasites (echinococcosis, toxocariasis);

· complications due to allergies (allergic pharyngitis and tracheitis, bronchial asthma);

Lung malformations (cystic fibrosis, bronchiectasis);

· helminths that parasitize the body (usually ascariasis).

In addition, a prolonged cough in children may also indicate the development of diseases such as heart failure and human papilloma virus.

Infants may have a cough due to problems with reflex swallowing. This factor determines that part of the consumed food, instead of entering the stomach, is thrown back into the esophagus.

Each of the pathologies listed above can be the reason why a child has been bothered by a lingering cough for about three weeks.

Associated symptoms

The main factor in the appearance of a severe cough will be the penetration of viruses and microbes into the respiratory tract. Cough may be accompanied by fever, tachycardia, vomiting, and the appearance of purulent exudate. If accompanying signs are present, you should immediately visit the doctor. The help of a specialist is also required if a cough causes insomnia in a child or if he constantly wakes up due to the urge to cough. As a rule, cough appears with colds.

However, its duration is no more than one week. If the child’s cough does not go away after this period and appears already in the third week, then this indicates that the trachea and vocal folds (cords) were also susceptible to inflammation.

The cough can be dry or wet. A dry cough affects exclusively the upper respiratory tract, while a wet cough affects the lower respiratory tract. The difference between a wet cough and a dry cough is the appearance of secretion or mucus (sputum). The forms of cough described above belong to the pathological type. But there is also a physiological type. This cough serves as a protective reaction and clears the airways of accumulated secretions. It is worth noting that therapy is carried out depending on the type of cough.

How to help your baby at home

A wet cough without fever in children can occur for physiological reasons. Most often, such spasms appear when the air is extremely dry and there is a large amount of dust in the room. In this case, treatment comes down to providing comfortable living conditions for the baby. First of all, you need to increase humidity (ventilation) and clean.

The next action should be to exclude allergic reactions. Lack of body temperature may be due to an incorrect response of the immune system to an external stimulus. It is necessary to check the child for accompanying symptoms (rash, runny nose, conjunctivitis) and, if necessary, exclude contact with a possible irritant. Most often, negative external factors include animal hair, household chemical fumes, and waste products of dust mites.

If a wet cough occurs unexpectedly, you can alleviate the patient’s condition before the doctor arrives:

• increasing the air flow into the room;
• clearing the sinuses of mucus (drops, suction);
• increasing humidity (steam generators, evaporation of hot water).

The child can calm down if you offer him a warm drink (tea, milk) and carry out a simple drainage massage (to speed up the removal of mucus accumulated in the respiratory tract).

An ambulance should be called if the patient’s temperature rises sharply, there are problems with breathing, wheezing is heard when exhaling, and a wet cough provokes bouts of vomiting.

For such symptoms, treatment should only be carried out under the supervision of a pediatrician. Possible sources of manifestations of the pathological condition are false croup and pneumonia.

When is a child’s cough dangerous after an illness?

Even taking into account the fact that a cough after bronchitis brings significant inconvenience to the child, it in itself does not pose any danger. The child has already passed the most serious stage of the disease, the viral infection and the bacteria that caused it have been resisted. After this, children can be safely sent to kindergarten and allowed to contact healthy people. However, there are a couple of nuances that parents need to consider.

Firstly, a persistent cough can sometimes be confused with signs of another illness or an exacerbation of colds and bronchitis. You cannot ignore factors such as its duration, the nature of its development and course; ask yourself whether it is possible to note the stabilization of your well-being. It is best to take your child to the doctor from time to time. If the baby has been coughing for more than three weeks, and the cough itself is characterized as unproductive and intrusive, accompanied by attacks, whooping cough can be removed from the list of possible diseases.

Secondly, if a dry cough does not go away for a week or more, this indicates that the baby’s immunity is not so smooth, and the affected bronchi will be a suitable place for new germs and viral infections to enter. Therefore, if there is any infection in the air among a group of children, there is a high probability that a child who has recently been ill and is still coughing may become infected with it. If there is such a possibility, it is advisable to protect the child from this for as long as possible, that is, until the prolonged cough stops.

Causes of residual cough

Residual cough in a child after ARVI can be diagnosed if it lasts three weeks. But how can you determine whether this is the norm or something more serious? If the main symptoms of a cold have passed, but the child’s cough does not go away, this can sometimes occur as a result of possible infectious complications.

The causes of a lingering cough in this case may be the following:

• pneumonia,
• Chronical bronchitis,
• whooping cough.

But more often than not, this is far from a terrible disease, but just a process of clearing the respiratory tract of mucus that could have accumulated during a cold.

Parents should monitor the child’s general condition: temperature, activity, sleep. If even a slightly elevated temperature persists, intestinal upset is present, the child does not eat, etc., you should definitely consult a doctor.

Also, a severe cough may indicate that the child has an allergy. What to do in this case? As a rule, it is enough to identify the allergen and avoid it; you can give the child an antihistamine (Cetrin, Suprastin).

Typically, a viral illness lasts about a week. During the infection, the mucous membrane of the respiratory tract becomes irritated and becomes quite sensitive. Therefore, even the entry of ordinary dust or dirt causes coughing.

So, we can highlight the main reasons why a child’s cough does not go away for a long time:

• psychological reasons
• hypothermia,
• allergic reaction (animal fur, cigarette smoke, dust, plants),
• inflammatory processes,

• 
  infectious diseases,

• dry air,
• worms,
• entry of a foreign body.

A persistent cough in a child can be of two types:

• dry,
• wet,

A long-term dry cough can persist with certain diseases - laryngitis, pharyngitis and even obstructive bronchitis. As a rule, with a dry cough there is nothing to cough up, but the receptors in the respiratory tract are irritated. Therefore, the child may cough in a specific, “barking” manner.

A wet cough means the release of mucus from the respiratory tract. This cough is also called productive. It is by sputum that the nature of the disease is determined, and they also use a fiber bronchoscope for effective examination of the respiratory tract; an example of a fiber bronchoscope can be seen here: lkmed.ru/catalog/fibrobronxoskopy/ .

If your child’s cough does not go away, you should pay attention to the following alarming symptoms of a wet cough:

• sputum turns green
• sputum contains blood elements,
• the child does not want to eat,
• the child has shortness of breath,
• chest pain appears.

In this case, you should immediately consult a doctor! If the cough does not go away for a long time, these signs may indicate pneumonia or even tuberculosis.

Here is a useful table for parents listing the most common types of residual cough (Table 1). In the table you can also find the main methods of treating this problem.

Table 1 - Types of residual cough and their therapy

What to do if the cough lasts 2-3 weeks, but there is no fever?

The first step in the fight against a child’s persistent cough without fever is to establish its root causes. To do this, studies such as:

· clinical blood test;

· sputum analysis;

· scleroscopy;

chest x-ray;

· bronchodilator tests.

If the cause of the cough cannot be determined, other diagnostic tests will be ordered. For example:

· immunological tests to detect atypical pathogens;

· CT (computed tomography);

· echocardiography – ultrasound of the heart;

· endoscopic examination of the trachea and bronchi, etc.

Thanks to this, it is possible to diagnose allergies and infectious diseases, the presence of a foreign object and other factors causing cough. After this, the doctor begins to select a course of therapy.

Cough for more than 3 weeks with fever

Almost always, an elevated temperature with an accompanying cough in children is a symptom of a respiratory disease. Similar signs can be observed in diseases caused by viruses or infection, for example, rubella, which appears in children from 2 to 9 years old.

Sometimes parents begin to cure their baby using home remedies and methods, not realizing that they are trying to overcome absolutely the wrong disease. Therefore, if you experience a cough and high temperature, you need to contact a specialist who will determine the root cause of the disease and prescribe suitable medications.

There are times when the symptoms of colds can be confused with an allergic reaction, since these same symptoms are characteristic of allergies. But it should be remembered that signs of an allergy appear for more than seven days, but at the same time such a reaction is not transmitted to other people. Therefore, if such symptoms appear in a child after interacting with other children, then, most likely, this is a cold.

Preventive actions

The treatment regimen for prolonged cough is drawn up depending on the disease that caused it. But for any disease, the following methods effectively affect cough.

• Air humidification. Heated dry air helps to dry out the mucous membrane of the respiratory tract, thereby causing mucus retention in the bronchi. Humidified air, on the contrary, improves well-being and ensures a quick transition from a non-productive cough to a wet one.
• Drink plenty of fluids. If enough fluid enters the body, it helps dissolve phlegm and promote its elimination. In addition, drinking plenty of fluids has an antitoxic effect if the cough was caused by viruses and bacteria.
• Inhalations. Inhalation as a method based on inhalation of medicinal herbal decoctions relieves spasms and has a calming and warming effect on the mucous membrane of the respiratory tract. Be sure to note that inhalation is not allowed for children under four years of age, or at high temperatures!
• Avoid passive smoking. Parents, of course, need to stop smoking, both with a sick and healthy child, because passive smoking causes the same harm as active smoking.

If your child exhibits all the symptoms of a prolonged cough, immediately consult a doctor who will conduct a medical diagnosis: be sure to take the necessary tests and follow all the instructions of the specialists. It should be remembered that every acute disease can become chronic and torment a person for the rest of his life. There is no need to let everything get to such an unpleasant outcome.

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How to treat a prolonged cough?

Depending on the type of cough, the patient is selected the necessary course of treatment. For a non-productive cough, therapy should be aimed at its transition from a dry to a wet form. To do this, herbal infusions and decoctions are used to gargle, and appropriate agents with an antibacterial and enveloping effect are taken. Sometimes it is advisable to use medications that restrain the cough reaction itself, but such medications can only be taken on the recommendation of a doctor.

To treat wet cough, mucolytic drugs are used to dissolve mucus and facilitate its separation. There are several types of mucolytics, and when selecting any medication, the right choice is of primary importance.

Many mucolytic agents cause a significant increase in the amount of secretion, which can result in such a dangerous syndrome as “flooding of the lungs.” In children, due to an underdeveloped cough reaction, the chance of this syndrome occurring is especially high. Therefore, antitussives must be not only effective, but also harmless, especially if it relates to a child.

In this case, it would be best to choose mucolytics containing carbocysteine, which are especially popular among pediatricians today due to their harmlessness and effectiveness.

Compared to other mucolytic drugs, drugs with carbocisteine, in addition to dissolving sputum, are also responsible for regulating (reducing) its volume, which makes it possible to avoid “flooding of the lungs.”

A common drug with carbocisteine ​​is Mucolic syrup 2%, available without a prescription, which can be used to cure cough even in children. Mucolic can be combined with other bronchodilators; it can also be used in combination with antibiotics, as it improves their effect, which is important when curing a persistent cough. The optimal price for the product makes it possible to overcome a cough without significant expenses.