Broken bones, a stomach virus and asthma

The title of the blog post sort of sums up what has plagued our house over the last week, week and half. My youngest son broke his collar bone on Saturday July 11 (with a little help from his clumsy older brother). Then last Thursday he became very ill. I took him back to the ER because I feared H1N1 (yes, he was that sick) but after checking him, they decided he had a stomach virus and sent us on our way. He seemed to be getting better but as of Saturday, he took another turn. As of now he has a double ear infection, a sinus infection and to make matters worse the illness has triggered his asthma.

He always has asthma and we keep it under control with medication. But when he gets ill, he suffers from viral or illness induced asthma that his preventative medications just can't control.

So, what do we do?

1. He takes a daily dose of a steroid inhaler, but in this case we double his normal dose.

2. He uses albuterol and for him, it works better through a nebulizer.

3. If neither of these seem to be helping, we may have to add in an oral steroid.

4. He also continues to take his daily preventative medications and we try to get him lots of rest.

It is recommended that if you have asthma you should get a flu shot. Unfortunately for my son, he is allergic to egg so he is unable to receive the flu shot so we try to take other measures to prevent illness and the flu.

It's currently not time for flu shots. I believe our pediatrician usually starts them in September or at the beginning of October. But when the time comes you can find a clinic near you that administers the flu shot here at the AAFA flu shot finder.

You can also click here for a list of summer asthma triggers and some tips to deal with those triggers.


If pollen is a trigger for you or your child check out pollen totals for your area at pollen.com.

Click here to watch a quick video on how to use a nebulizer from VideoMD.

For more information on asthma, triggers and how to manage your asthma, see WEGO Health'sasthma pages or visit WEGO Health's Asthma and Allergy community.