Evaluation of patients with chronic cough in school age children

Abstract

Introduction: Chronic cough is a common problem in childhood. Simple viral infections can cause chronic cough, as well as underlying progressive diseases. For this reason, guidelines that can be applied in clinical practice are very valuable. In our study, we aimed to evaluate our school-age patients with chronic cough in the light of the literature.
 Material Method:
 The files of children over the age of 6 who applied to the pediatric allergy outpatient clinic between January 2022 and June 2022 with cough for more than 4 weeks were evaluated retrospectively.
 Results:
 182 patients aged 6-17.9 years were included in the study. 62.1% of the patients were male, the mean age was 9.8±3.8 years. 32.4% of our patients had asthma; 43.4% Upper airways cough syndrome (20.9% sinusitis, 17.6% allergic rhinitis, 4.9% non-allergic rhinitis); 7.68% Protracted bacterial bronchitis; 6.59% postinfectious cough; 4.9% of our patients had psychogenic cough; 2.2% Gastroesophageal reflux disease; 1.1% patients had brochiectasis; 1.1% of patients had primary ciliary dyskinesia; 0.55% of the patients were diagnosed with eosinophilic esophagitis.
 Conclusion:
 Chronic cough in childhood can be caused by many different underlying diseases. It is observed that patients often use drugs such as antibiotics and symptom relievers unnecessarily. Accurate evaluation of patients, especially taking a detailed history, is very important in the management of these cases. It is very valuable to evaluate each patient individually.