Asthma and Children

Yes, your smoking will affect your child with newly diagnosed asthma. Your child will be affected in many different ways.

A peak-flow meter is a tool that you and your child can use to help assess the degree of asthma control at any given time. Even though some might erroneously view self-monitoring as a “bother” or a “nuisance,” it should be neither.

Obviously, it’s best to relocate your pet or never get one in the first place. But your child may feel very strongly about having a pet, especially in the early school years when ‘show and tell’ sessions often turn on stories about household members, including pets, family trips, etc. It is crucially important that you relocate your pet to a new home.

Some pediatricians will not even use the term “asthma” until a child is 2 years of age or older. Wheezing in infancy is never normal. It can, however, be divided into two general patterns: non-allergic wheezing and allergic wheezing (Table Patterns of Wheezing in Infants).

Milk is not a cause of increased mucus production, nor is it considered to be an asthma trigger (Table Asthma Myths and Falsehoods). Consumption of milk has no effect on lung capacity, either deleterious or beneficial.

Asthma is not an infectious condition. It cannot be transmitted from person to person, nor can it spread between people. That said, it has been noted for many years that the tendency to develop asthma tends to run in families.