Chronic Cough For Baby

by Tammy
(Minnesota)

I have a 7 month old who has had a cough for 1.5 months now. I had him to the Dr after three weeks and we tried a course of Amoxicillin for 10 days but it didn't clear up the cough totally.

The Dr thought he may have allergies, so we are trying a cold mist humidifier in our bedroom at night. He continues to cough and is congested in the morning. He coughs up phlegm in the morning. I have also sprayed an allergy spray on our blankets, carpets and pillows to alleviate some allergens.

What other home remedies should I try?

Baby Help Line:

What To Do For Baby's Persistent Cough

6 weeks of persistent cough is a long time for a baby and you did the right thing to seek advice after three weeks. Unfortunately the Amoxicillin didn't help and it is now time for the next step.

First of all, do you know what triggered the cough in the first place? Did your son have a cold? Sometimes a cough can stay for a long time after any other symptoms of a cold have disappeared and as long as the child isn't showing other signs of illness, it is not much to worry about.

But there are other possible causes for a chronic cough as well, including allergies, infections in the sinus or airways, acid reflux, and asthma, for example.

I really don't think you should settle with "maybe allergy" as an answer from your son's doctor. Require further investigation!

What you can do at home in addition to the humidifier are to:

Raise the head end of your son's bed to ease his breathing at night.

Use only very mild washing powder, soap and shampoo.

Sometimes a warm bath in humid, moist air can help. Try it before bed time to see if it makes him sleep better.

Think back if you bought any particular flowers or plants before the cough started. Then check if any of them are very allergenic, and in such case get rid of them.

A chronic cough can also be a symptom of cow's milk allergy, so if you have introduced cow's milk to your son, consider reversing that and see if it helps.(You can read more about the symptoms of milk protein allergy here.)

If any allergies run in the family, discuss those with the doctor as well.

Aside from allergies, nasal congestion due to sinus infection may be causing mucus producing cough in babies. In that case the mucus does not come from the chest, but rather drips down from the nose and makes the baby cough to evacuate it.

If your baby is also experiencing poor weight gain, despite eating normally, is often constipated and has a salty taste to his skin, running a simple test for cystic fibrosis might be a reasonable thing to do.

Otherwise, I believe your baby will outgrow the cough and the allergies sooner or later.

I hope this helps,

Paula

(Answer approved by our Medical Reference Team)

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Comments for
Chronic Cough For Baby

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Dec 23, 2008

Cough
by: Anonymous

Our daughter who is 5 months has had a cough since the end of October. We have been to the Dr numerous times, did a chest xray (clear), 10 days of antibiotics and now she is on Zantak. The cough has not gone away and the Dr thinks it may be reflux now. It is so upsetting, we feel helpless when she coughs and it exaggerates at night so we are not sleeping at all. Not sure what to do next, hoping the Zantak will help.

Jun 10, 2009

chronic cough
by: Anonymous

My daughter is four months old and has had a cough since about one month old. We have tried nebulizers, steriods, antibiotics and now are waiting for the results of her chest x-rays.

Jun 16, 2009

Cronic cough-poor baby
by: concerned grandma

have you found any relief. My grandaughter is 7 months, has had cronic cough since 2 months. She is especially bad at night, coughing all night long. She is on nebulizer/steroids, Zantac, seems like so much medicine, and no relief. She also wheezes and has labored breathing at times. Does anyone else have a child that went through this, and if so, did you find a solution?

Dec 09, 2009

my baby is the same way
by: Lorena

she has been sick for almost a month- month n a half. they have her amoxicillan for 10 days and cphen drops but hasnt cleared her up?? has anyone found a cure or what to do to help with the coughing, and wheezing? email me forever051509@yahoo.com if have any answers

Dec 09, 2009

chronic cough is finally better!
by: Anonymous

My little guy is now 19 months old, but last year at this time I was very frustrated. We finally put him on Zyrtec (which dried his nose too much!) and continued the cool mist humidifier in his room. I can say it has gotten better! What we finally discovered with him is that he has an allergy to evergreens and pine cones! I had those smelly decorative cones everywhere so my house would smell nice and only to discover those nice smelly cones made it very miserable and hard for him to breathe!! We removed them all out of the house and within a week, he was better. I guess we will no longer ever have a real Christmas tree! I hope this helps anybody who has read and commented on my blog! Thanks!

Jan 27, 2010

5 month old w/ cough
by: Mamato2Boys

My 5 month old has had a persistent cough for about 2 months now. He coughed so hard at times he would vomit. We took him to the Peds office last Monday and they did an xray to find a diaphragmatic hernia. His bowels and colon were up through the diaphragm and were against his left lung. They thought this may be causing the cough. He has surgery last Thursday to repair the hernia, but the cough still remains. I'm nervous he is going to cough hard enough to create a hernia again! We go see the ped again tomorrow and the pediatric surgeon suggest we have him refer us to a pediatric pulmonologist. Praying for each of you because I know what you are going through and how helpless you feel.

Jul 14, 2010

cough
by: Anonymous

My baby is now 9 months old and she's had a cough since she was like 3 or 4 months I tried everything from amoxicillin to c-phen when it seems it's gone away it's back again. Every night I take her a warm bath rub some vapor rub on her chest and feet, I apply some saline drops in her nose and give her a little bit on honey that makes her sleep good through the night. hopefully this helps, also seems like he allergie medicine helps her stay calm during the day.

Aug 13, 2010

No Honey!
by: Anonymous

To the poster before me - you should consult your doctor about giving your child honey. All reports, books, and doctors I have encountered are ADAMANT about not giving babies under a year Honey due to a risk of infant botulism.

Dec 17, 2010

SAFE THEN SORRY
by: Anonymous

me and my brother we grow up on honey since we start teething so if little bit of honey is not going to kill.Honey is very good for everybody.We just moved to England and im shocked how children walk in this country.No scarth, glowes,nothing particular babies. im not surprised in uk is highest % of meningitis and other illness.parents dont look after children,they have big jacket but not children.I keeping my babies warm and comfy them cold and seek all the time with cought and other staf.SO keep them safe then sorry.

Dec 19, 2010

Honey not for babies
by: Paula (Baby Help Line)

Hi,

Honey is very nutritious for anyone older than one year. For younger children, the spores of the Clostridium botulinum bacteria, that are sometimes present in honey, can be very dangerous. Young babies can develop infant botulism from these spores and although rare, a baby may die from it.

So do not feed honey to your baby.

You can read more about what foods to avoid for babies younger than one year here.

Warm wishes,

Paula

Dec 22, 2010

7 month old with the same issue
by: Anonymous

My 7 month old son has had a chronic cough/wheezing since about 2 months old. He always smiles at me while he is coughing, but you can tell it bothers him. It is always worse in the morning. He has slept with a cool mist humidfier for months now. It doesn't seem to help much honestly. At his 6 month check up, he was diagnosed with Bronchiolitis, however I don't think that is what he has, as it has gone on much longer than 3 weeks. His appetite is still enormous and he is in the 90th percentile for height and weight. I just want his wheeze and cough to go away! Poor thing!

Jan 29, 2011

13 month old with the same problem
by: Anonymous

My 13 month old has had a chronic cough since she was about 7 months old. It's always there but during the day it's not too severe. But at night and during her naps it's extremely severe and makes her whoop and gag. She's had 3 courses of antibiotics, all of which have cleared up the cough only for it to return a week or so later, and has also been treated for asthma and allergies, with limited affect. She did have a wheeze as well for a while and the asthma treatment seems to have helped that, but it hasn't helped the cough at all. She also has had a chronically very runny and blocked nose since she was about 5 months so we've tried piraton a few times, but all that did was thicken up the mucous and made no difference to the cough. We're waiting for a chest x-ray at the moment. I just hope it sheds some light on the problem.

Apr 19, 2011

GRR~
by: Anonymous

I am in the same boat. I thought it was due to the fact that my doc has me on Vicodin and that it was getting into the breastmilk, but now I think it has got to be something else. I wish we could find relief for our little loves!

Jun 08, 2011

New older mom
by: Anonymous

My son has had this cough ever since he started going to daycare at 2 months, he is now 7 months. His ped has tried a couple of antibiotics and the 2nd worked and then the cough came back again. She asked me to see a pulmonologist and make sure it is nothing serious. I'll let you know if I find a cure or a good tip on this.
Like a mom above explained, other than the coughing, specially in the mornings, my baby smiles a lot, eats a lot and he is in the 90 percentile.
It is relieving to se that many babies have the same symptoms and are healthy.

Jun 11, 2011

Update: 13 month baby with same problem
by: Anonymous

I posted about 5 months ago about my 13 month daughter with the same problem. She's since seen a ped, who arranged a chest x-ray which came back fine - which was no surprise as she's never shown any sign of susceptibility to chest infections despite her asthma and other problems.

As soon as he'd established that she didn't have anything wrong with her chest the ped lost interest, seemed to forget why the GP had referred her to him in the first place and started treating me like an over-protective mother when I asked him to continue to look into the cause of her cough and forever runny nose. Eventually, after much persuasion on my part, he made a very reluctant referral to ENT (ear, nose & throat), with a cover letter stating pretty much that I'd insisted on a waste of time referral! Luckily the ENT Dr took one look at her and could see what was wrong straight away, so ignored the ped's letter.

It turned out that my daughter has very inflamed adenoids, tonsils and nasal passages, and also glue ear. So I'm very glad I insisted on that 'waste of time' referral! The ENT DR thinks that the adenoids are causing her cough because they're causing pressure on her breathing. He wants to monitor her for a short while, but say's it's likely that they'll need to be taken out later this year.

In the mean time her cough isn't quite as severe as it used to be. After 6 months of having a very severe 'whooping' style every night , it now ranges from light to very severe depending on whether she has anything else bothering her as well. The big change was changing her washing powder to a very mild non-biological liquid, which helped her cough massively. It's also helped by her asthma treatment, but that doesn't get rid of it. Neither had any effect at all on her runny nose.

So, if anyone else' child is having this same problem and can't find any other cause, I'd strongly recommend insisting on an ENT referral, even if your ped thinks it's a waste of time. You know you're child better than they do.

Nov 02, 2011

Chronic Cough
by: Donna

Hi, my name is Donna I have a 3 and 1/2 year old daughter. My daughter has had a cough since she was 4 months old. Her cough sounds very harsh, she normally coughs during the day and in the fall and winter. She has had tubes put in her ears, adenoids, and tonsils removed. That did not help with the dreaded cough. She also has had a bronchoscopy of her throat, stomach, and lungs. Everything came back fine, we took her to an allergist and they said she was alleric to cats and ragweed. Well all summer long she played with the cats outside and never once coughed. Last year she was on flovent, atrovent, albutrol, nasonex, and claritin all of these medications did not work. She coughed all fall and winter long. The dreaded cough came back in October and we took her to the pulmonary doctor and she changed some medication. Now, she is taken advair inhaler, claritin, and nasonex. She seems to doing pretty well on the advair. I also have been given her probiotics and silver biotics to help with her immune system.

Mar 26, 2012

my poor bug
by: lilma

my daughter is ten months old and has had the same persistent cough and runny nose. she has had numerous problems with her ears. i really wonder if it could be glue ear as the other post above me. fingers crossed ill have to ask the doctor about that when i go for her 12 month checkup. also she goes to daycare and picks up everything she also has had issues with eyes and has had pretty bad eye infections where they swell up and goop comes out of them. has anyone else had these issues and if so any help you could give me as in home remedies besides drops to keep allergies down or what could be causing it?????????

Feb 28, 2013

Honey!?!?
by: Anonymous

I was looking for some other at home remedies for my daughter who has recently developed a cough when I came across the honey suggestion. My daughter is 16 months old and her pediatrician has suggested honey on numerous occasions. She has stated that studies have shown that the "grandmother" remedies are actually being proven to be more effective then cough syrups and medications. I also found an overwhelming amount of research on he Internet suggesting honey was both good and bad for children it's all very confusing without a straight awnser.

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