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Whooping
Cough symptoms come in stages of differing severity
- Phase 1: Cold-like symptoms
- Cough
- Mild fever - or no fever at all in
early stages
- Running nose
- Sore throat
- Mild dry cough
- Sneezing
- Tears
- Tiredness
- Loss of appetite
- Night cough
- Phase 2: Coughing spasms: - this is the
dangerous phase of the disease.
- Coughing spasms - followed by the
"whoop" breath intake.
- Rapid breath intake - the
characteristic "whoop" noise
- Dry racking cough - in cases where the
cough is not severe enough to "whoop".
- Breathing difficulties - all of these
are serious, and are very dangerous for babies.
- Holding breath (infant) - in newborns
with undeveloped cough reflex. Instead of coughing babies may appear to
hold their breath. They may exhale too much and not inhale enough or
they may turn blue instead of coughing.
- Non-breathing periods (apnea) -
breathing stops for a period of coughing.
- Blue or purple (cyanosis) - an
inadequate supply of oxygen to the body. Newborns might go blue without
coughing.
- Convulsions - not enough oxygen to
the brain can cause convulsions.
- Choking - the flem from the throat
infection can interfere with breathing.
- Feeding difficulties - The cough also
leaves little time to eat or drink. The act of feeding can also trigger
a coughing fit, making it hard to feed an infant.
- Vomiting
- Retching
- Nosebleeds
- Diarrhea
- Fever
- Phase 3: Gradual recovery:
Whoop-like
cough may recur due to other respiratory
infections
After about 1 to 2 weeks, the
dry, irritating cough evolves into
coughing spells. During a coughing spell, which can last for more than
a minute, the child may turn red or purple. At the end of a spell, the
child may make a characteristic whooping sound when breathing in or may
vomit. Between spells, the child usually looks and feels well. In
some infants the characteristic whooping sound is absent, some dont
cough or whoop at all, they just look as though their gasping for air,
their face may turn red, and in severe cases they may even stop
breathing altogther for a few seconds. All of which is very
stressful to onlookers.
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