Does Anyone Have Info on Reoccuring Croup?

Just fyi... doctor's prescribe antibiotics for bacterial infections. if it is a viral infection, antibiotics won't work. viral infections are treated for symptom relief, and that's all you can do.
you could try something that boosts his immune system, or try homeopathic treatments. i have had good success with those, and they are entirely safe. ask someone at a natural food store to help you.

Whatever you do, DON'T give him cough medicine. Our 6-year old son, Evan, passed away in May due to cough medicine. His liver was not able to metabolize the medicine. Common in 20% of children.

Have you tried taking him to an Allergy and Asthma Specialist? My son kept getting recurring sinus infections and coughs, and I mean recurring by that he seemed to have one about a week after he woudl go off antibiotics, if the drugs even worked in the first place. The last straw for me was when I took him to the ER when he was 11 months old with a fever of 105.3 and the ER doc told me that it was another sinus infection and gave him an antibiotic shot, after I refused to let him do a spinal tap on my son to check for meningitis. I only refused the spinal tap because the symptoms that my son was showing was not meningitis and the doc's reasoning for wanting to do the spinal didn't make sense to me, although I will admit that I am not a doctor, it was a weird situation that you would have had to have been there to understand my logic. Anyway, the ER doc said that if he was having the reoccuring infections then I should look into having tubes put in his ears. He already had tubes, that were inserted when he was 6 months old due to constant ear infections that could not be cured with anything. When I told him this, he suggested having his adenoids removed. Well, I took my son back to the ENT and he said that my son's adenoids appeared to be fine, but after a little conversation and getting some background medical information, he suggested that I take him to an allergist to see if I could reduce his exposure to whatever his was allergic to, which my son already had 2 known allergens. I was so thrilled that I took him to the allergist, I found that my son had asthma, not a major case of it, but he had asthma. After 1 week of the nebulizer and preventative asthma medicine, he was my happy baby again and has only had 1 sinus infection and 1 cold since, and he is now 18-1/2 months old. I was told by the allergist that my son's asthma and allergies were causing excess mucus build up which was causing the deep chest coughing (and sometimes bronchitis) and sinus infections. Good luck and I hope this helps.

Dear C.,
I don't really have any advice. I just wanted to reassure you. My now 18 year old got croup every winter, sometimes several times a winter until he was five or six years old. We still have a problem sometimes with a winter cough, but other than that, he is very healthy. He's a runner too, and it doesn't slow him down. I used to worry that he had ashtma, but it never developed into that. So, I wouldn't worry too much.

Have they considered asthma? My 7 year old went through this, and twice we treated him for asthma. The first time was when he was about 3. He'd cough sometimes at night until he threw up - they were such deep, hard coughs. We treated him with some oral meds for asthma. Hoping he'd outgrown it, we stopped the meds a year or so later. He seemed to be developing bouts of coughing again over the past year or so. This summer, he and a couple of his siblings had pneumonia. They got over it. He couldn't seem to. He'd cough mainly at night. When I'd take him in to see the doctor during the day, he wasn't coughing or wheezing. Finally, one morning, he was still coughing, so I drug him to the doctor's office so that she could hear him in 'distress'. He had also started having some difficulty with coughing after playing outside or playing a soccer game. It took some oral steroids and 2 breathing treatments to get him to stop coughing and wheezing. He is now on long term asthma meds and has a rescue inhaler. He's doing great! I think there are some outdoor allergy triggers for him, and the doctor agrees that is probably right. We haven't gone yet to the point of having him tested for allergies. Apparently, sometimes those even come back negative, but the child will still react to the substance in the air.
Anyway, it sounds similar to your experiences - perhaps your son has some allergies, and these things can then cause a reaction - often it is not immediate, meaning as soon as he steps outside, but delayed several hours later (my understanding is that it takes a while for the tissues in the lungs to become inflammed and mucus to build up to the point of 'blocking' airways).
Hope this helps.

I had this when I was about 2-3 years old, Im now 23. At the time I had it they didn't believe it was Croup because they thought it was extinct. I ended up having the cough for a few weeks each winter when it was could out and as u stated only at night, when I woke up for school I was fine, besides maybe being a bit tired from coughing all night. The Dr's also had me use a humidifier and gave me an inhaler. As I started to get older and it continued my parents took me to more and more doctors as no one could give me a true diagnosis. It was to the point I was coughing so hard I would literally gag myself and throw up! As I got older the doctors also decided to check me for allergies, do some breathing tests, and put me on steroids when I got the cough (as well as still using the inhaler and humidifier, although the inhaler never really worked). I eventually started to grow out of it and now have only a little cough for a few weeks each winter. I couple years ago I saw my Dr about it again this year and she said my signs and symptoms didn't seem to be those of reoccurring croup but instead it was possible that either my breathing tubes were too small, so when it got cold outside they would swell, causing me to cough or that it could be a virus she had only seen once or twice. (Im sorry, I don't remember the name of it). Anyways, best advice I can give you is to try the steroids, get an allergy test, and also do some breathing tests. One last suggestion, there WAS a medicine that I remember helping me a little when I was younger, I don't know the name but it was pink in color and tasted like either banana or bubble gum and it was Dr prescribed. Sorry I couldn't be of any more help!

I'm not a health care provider, but, antibiotics are for bacterial infections, there are not a whole lot of options for viral infections. My OPINION is that the croup is not reoccurring, but never cured in the first place. You son's immune system will knock it back for awhile, but when his body is stressed (cold temps) the virus outpowers his immune system. It's going back and forth.

When my daughter had viral pneumonia, it took almost 2 weeks, one to get the symptoms knocked back but another week of rest to rebuild.

Good luck!

My now 5 year old had it or some variation of throat problem every 2 months for his first few years, until we had his tonsils out. You said he gets it when it is cold outside, try taking him outside for a moment then come back in, or hold him in front of the open freezer door, if this clears the coughing it is croup. If not, prob not croup. Croup is also not treated with an inhaler. If the inhaler is a steroid that is better but be sure to have him rinse his mouth out really good. Asthma sounds more likely. Good luck to you!

I did a google search on "recurrent croup" and a few things came up that suggest possible abnormalities in the trachea to acid reflux. It's possible that it's not actually croup but that when he comes down with a cold he gets "croupy" due to something else going on. I would suggest following up with a specialist such as a pediatric pulmonologist or ENT to get to the root of the problem.
http://www.pslgroup.com/dg/25bd02.htm
This was one site that mentioned recurrent croup.

C.,
Has your son ever been tested for Astma? Or maybe allergies?
My so is 8 and at night is when we have problems with his asthma. Its not everynight but it happens around 2-3 Am most of the time. To be honest it does sound a little like croup.
I hope this helps
K.
www.youravon.com/kstaab

My 3yo son had croup twice within a short period of time. His ped said that if he had it again within a 12 month period they would consider it to be something other than viral croup. I can't remember the exact terminology, but basically they would start to suspect something along the lines of asthma and would do the necessary testing to determine if that was the cause. Oh, I think it was something like spasmotic croup (not sure if I spelled that correctly) instead of viral croup. He never did have croup again, so we didn't have to worry about it. If your ped doesn't seem concerned, I would either demand some further testing or get a second opinion.

Sorry if anyone may have pointed this out, but I just had a quick minute to type in here this morning.

Personally after several years I was able to kick the "I get a cold every winter and it's lasts until Spring" mentality myself, but THIS year for whatever the reason may be I too have had this annoying "reoccuring" crud now as an adult. I identified some of the environmentals in my current life stance, I looked into the nutritional choices I have changed and /or added to my life recently, and then yes, I AM older, soo thus working out and taking care of my body is a huge deal of course.

However, all that being said, I have done a ton of research into not just Milk, and all the phlegm that it causes, but yes; Sodas, and the effects of sugar, and carbs that break down into sugars in our bodies. I was amazed to have discovered low and behold that this is such a HUGE deal when it comes to "cluttering up" or "creating congestion" in our bodies! Then Also from an environment stance, "clean out all the clutter" ... do some Spring cleaning and Decluttering of things and situations in your life and one will be amazed...How this can effect YOU as Mom, and then the trickle down effect YOUR "centeredness" can have on the kiddos. Not that we are to blame, that is not what I said, but that our emotional/environmental responses to stress/ and just life in general plays huge into the healthiness of our kids.

As for the kiddos, once we did this for myself and them, THEY are Croup Free, and clutter free to boot! 2 weeks! I kid you not! Course I did go completely overboard so that may not be for everyone, but I was so sick and tired of being sick and tired and everyone just passin this gunk around...That is just what worked for us.
No more chips, crackers, flour products like cookies and sweets; except the occassional cheetos :O). No more sodas (we had slipped into a rut),No more juices unless freshly juiced, upped our water intake, waaaay more protein ( mainly from egg whites / & Peanut Butter for my youngest age 4) and cleaned out all the clutter in my house and took a huge load to charity. AND without a doubt No more Milk unless "in" something we make. My youngest doesn't still eat alot of good meat/protein, but will eat broccoli, and sausage, pepporoni, lunch meat, so keeping that on a low basis, because of the salt / nitrates, but ...When it comes to kids really, alot can be cured really by diet , getting them out and about in the SUN/Vit D whenever possible,Get them hooked on fresh fruits and uncooked veggies ... and cut out the over use of any antibiotics if you can feel safe with that... and since my husband is a chiropractor, we up the use of this treatment as well.

Finally, we got it up and out of here, and we are healthier having kicked some of those bad habits. My home is clean :O). It was a huge wake up call for Mom, let me tell you . And to think "I" was the problem allowing all that gunk in my home in the first place after having given it all up for myself so long ago. Not anymore! Oh, and I would also suggest looking into having your duct work in your home vaccuumed out by a professional... this was sooo cool, and a huge deal in our clean air envirnment. You would be shocked at what is in there ...even in a new home! Find out more about this online...

Take Care, HTH!
Be Blessed!@

has he been tested for Asthma? sometimes it flairs up by allergies. He may need to use a nebulizer. My son had asthma and he had a barking cough for a few months and figured out it was from burning wood which was our only source of heat at that time. Well after we figured out what the problem was we had to quit burning wood and bought ceramic heaters for each room. After we quit burning wood, he got a lot better and never heard him cough like that again.