Croup cough in babies can be caused by many things such as allergens, irritants, cigarette smoke, and bacteria, but the most common cases is caused by a virus. Several types of virus such as adenovirus, influenza, respiratory syncytial virus, and measles can trigger this health problem in your baby. Children between 6 months and 3 years old are more prone to this croup cough. According to Madicinet.com, the statistic of the disease jumps up in the months between October and March.
Croup cough itself is a swelling of the larynx or the voice box and trachea or windpipe. This swollen condition causes by inflammation and may narrows the windpipe result in hoarseness or barking cough especially when your baby cries. In severe cases, it can lead to breathing difficulties marked by temporal reddish or bluish face. In case it happened, take your baby to the hospital soon since this condition classified as a serious health problem.
According to babycenter.com, this croup cough may come after several days of common cold signs and usually get worse at night. Other sighs may appear as crowning noise when breath, labored breathing, and sometimes it come with a low-grade fever.
Mild croup cough treatment
After your doctor diagnoses the condition and he or she tells that your baby has mild croup cough condition, then you should be able to treat your baby at home through several simple ways. As stated above, the most common causes of the disease are viruses so antibiotic won’t work on it. You also not recommended to gives your baby cough or cold drugs. If your baby has a low-grade fever, ask your doctor whether you can give your baby acetaminophen or ibuprofen.
To reduce the swelling of the airways, the standard course of action is to give your baby moist or cold air therapy. You can expose your infant to warm and moist steam from hot water in bathroom for 10 to 15 minutes. Exposing your infant to the cool night air can also help to alleviate the breathing difficulty.
Avoid using aspirin along the croup cough treatment since it may relate to Reye’s syndrome development. This Reye’s syndrome classifies as a serious heath condition that can causing liver, brain, and kidney disease. An advance stage of the disease can lead to the rapid onset of coma. If acetaminophen or ibuprofen doesn’t work, doctor usually will prescribe cortisone medications to relieve the inflammation.
If the croup cough is cause by allergen or irritant such as cigarette smoke, make sure to avoid those allergens and irritants far away from your infants. Give your infant plenty of fluid to avoid dehydration and make sure your infant to get totally rest. To maintain a humid environment, you might try to use a cool-mist humidifier in your infant’s room.
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