You and your child’s clinician need to be in partnership with each other.  Together, you should develop a “plan” for using asthma medicines.  As part of the plan, everyone has a role.  Your clinician will suggest the best medicines and teach you how to give them to your child properly.  You should know what medications your child is taking as well as how and when to give them.  Most asthma medications need to be taken on a daily basis to control the asthma symptoms.  Your child needs to take the medicines, and as he/she gets older, will have more and more responsibility to care for his/her own asthma.  Plans work their best when everyone does their part.  If one part of the team begins to change the plan without telling the others, then the plan starts to fall apart.

You should notice an improvement in your child’s asthma symptoms after a week or so of taking daily medicines.  When your child starts to get better, it is very tempting to stop giving your child their daily medicines, and some parents stop the medicine once the child is symptom free.  Sometimes, your child does not want to take the medicines all the time.  Unfortunately, the symptoms usually return after a short period of time after daily medicines are stopped.  Not following the plan by starting and stopping the daily medicines will make it very hard to ever get the asthma under control.

As with any chronic disease, remembering to give a medicine everyday, especially if your child looks healthy, is a challenge.  Here are some tips that might make it easier to stick to the plan:

INFANTS AND YOUNG CHILDREN

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