Greetings of spring with cough and snuffles

                                                                                                                       4. April 2017

Last Friday, Mrs. K. registered her two sons for an acute appointment because of their cough, snuffles and fever. Simon (13) and Elias (14) first came to the practice a few years ago with complaints of stomach pains and bowel problems. Mother is also a patient in our family practice. She suffers from hay fever and food allergies, the greatest problems being with cow's milk and gluten.

The children's symptoms were not quite so acute. They have been there for a few weeks since the beginning of March, sometimes better and sometimes worse. Because Simon's fever went up again and Mrs. K. was still anxious from the experience with Elias' pneumonia some time before, she brought the children for treatment before the weekend.

Simon has had a “barking” cough since quite a while. I asked him to please cough a couple of times. Indeed the cough sounded neither dry nor “wet” with phlegm, but rather hoarse coming from the larynx (at the level of the vocal cords) as though the airways there were narrowed. Some mothers would describe such a cough as “like a little dog barking”. This is the typical description of the cough of “croup”, a frightening attack which could happen to small children in the night with wheezing on inspiration (stridor) and shortness of breath. Parents often seek help in the emergency department of hospitals because of the fear that the child might suffocate. The episode is less dramatic with older children. Many of these children have a tendency to have repeated croup attacks or to have a croupy (barking) cough when they catch a cold, especially in early spring and autumn.

From my experience, a barking cough is not just a simple virus infection of the vocal cord area. Especially if it tends to be repetitive, it speaks for an over reactive basic state of the airways, which is what “allergy” means. There are often other expressions of this allergic basis such as hay fever or asthma like symptoms in the family. I always ask about the child's previous history, the association with the seasons and the family history.

The mother thought for a long time and could not quite answer the question, whether Simon was also coughing a lot during the same season last year. Simon, however, could remember it well, “yes, I coughed a lot on my birthday and before too.” His birthday is on the first of April. So, during the same spring season, when mother has hay fever symptoms, Simon is also susceptible to coughing. The homeopathic remedy for a barking cough would be Spongia, D30, 3 times daily 5 pieces.

Simon also had a blocked snuffle. The allergic reaction and the infection caused swelling of the nasal mucosa. The nose is almost completely blocked, left and right side alternating, and mucous secretions could not flow down. This could lead to the danger of Sinusitis. His fever was a warning signal. Nose drops to decrease the mucosal swelling and medicines to dispel the phlegm (“expectorants”) would be necessary to avoid further infection and inflammation of the sinuses.

The elder brother Elias had a really dry cough. This irritant cough sounded rough, was short and frequent, “staccato” without long stops. The homeopathic remedy for it would be Sticta pulmonalia, D30, 3 times daily 5 pieces. While listening to the chest I noticed reduced breath sounds on expiration. The child could breathe out better if he pressed his tummy with his hand. There is obstacle to breathing out caused by narrowing of the small airways. This is the point on which the diagnosis “asthma” or “obstructive bronchitis” is based. I prescribed regular inhalation with physiological salt solution first. If the difficulty with breathing got worse, it would be necessary to use “bronchodilators” (medicines which act to widen and relax the narrowed small airways again).

From a holistic point of view, the two children and their mother show different symptoms of the same allergic basis. The bowels, the middle of the human organism, is the important centre of most of the immunological events in the body. All three patients have problems with the digestive system. The mother admitted, that since she has stayed away from cow's milk products and cereals containing gluten, after blood tests confirmed the intolerance of these, and went through treatment of the intestinal flora, her hay fever this year has been significantly better. Logically, I recommended that the children follow the same measures and treatment.