Symptoms from asthma occur when the muscles surrounding the breathing tubes squeeze and tighten, which makes it very difficult to get air inside the lungs and body. Every child with asthma is unique and has their own symptoms, which may differ from other children with asthma. For many children, their only symptom may be coughing. Other common symptoms include shortness of breath, difficulty breathing, chest tightness, and wheezing. In addition, each child may have different symptoms depending on the day and what triggered their symptoms at that time.
Video Transcript
Kevin never wheezes, so I know that his asthma isn’t a problem.
What do you mean?
Many children with asthma never have wheezing, at least that you can hear yourself without a stethoscope.
Symptoms from asthma occur when the muscles surrounding the breathing tubes squeeze and tighten.
Which makes it very difficult to get air inside the lungs and body.
For many children, their only symptom may be coughing.
Other common symptoms include shortness of breath, difficulty breathing, chest tightness, and wheezing.
Every child with asthma is unique and has their own symptoms which may differ from other children with asthma.
In addition each child may have different symptoms depending upon the day and what triggered their asthma symptoms at that time.
A late sign of asthma is when your child uses their rib muscles or neck muscles to help them breathe or becomes very short of breath.
If you see this, this means that they are working very hard to breathe and they need to be treated with their rescue medicine immediately.
You may also have to take them to the emergency room as they can become very tired if they breathe like this for too long.
Wow – I didn’t know all of that, thanks!
I’ll really make sure I pay attention when my child coughs.
