Coughing
Coughing might sometimes be uncomfortable, but it actually serves a useful purpose. When you cough, you bring up mucus and foreign material from your airways that can irritate your lungs. Coughing can also be in response to inflammation or illness.
Most coughs are short-lived. You may catch a cold or the flu, cough for a few days or weeks, and then you’ll start to feel better.
Chronic Cough
Less often, a cough lingers for several weeks, months, or even years. When you keep coughing without an obvious cause, you may have something serious.
A cough that lasts eight weeks or more is called a chronic cough. Even chronic coughs often have a treatable cause. They can result from conditions like postnasal drip or allergies. Only rarely are they a symptom of cancer or other potentially life-threatening lung conditions.
A chronic cough can have a big impact on your life, though. It can keep you awake at night and distract you from work and your social life. That’s why you should have your doctor check out any cough that lasts for more than three weeks.
Chronic Cough Treatment
Determining the cause of chronic cough is crucial to effective treatment. In many cases, more than one underlying condition may be causing your chronic cough.If you're taking an ACE inhibitor medication, your doctor may switch you to another medicine that doesn't have a cough as a side effect.
Medications used to treat chronic cough may include:
- Antihistamines, glucocorticoids and decongestants. These drugs are standard treatment for allergies and postnasal drip.
- Inhaled asthma drugs. The most effective treatments for asthma-related cough are glucocorticoids and bronchodilators, which reduce inflammation and open up your airways.
- Antibiotics. If a bacterial infection is causing your chronic cough, your doctor may prescribe antibiotics.
- Acid blockers. When lifestyle changes don't take care of acid reflux, you may be treated with medications that block acid production. Some people need surgery to resolve the problem.
- Cough suppressants. If the reason for your cough can't be determined and it's causing serious problems for you, such as keeping you from sleeping, your doctor may prescribe a cough suppressant. However, there's no evidence that over-the-counter cough medicines are effective.