Everyone will experience numerous colds in their lifetime, and cough is one of the typical symptoms of a cold. How to differentiate between "cough due to a cold" and "cough due to pneumonia"?
The main aspects to consider are as follows:
1. Look at whether there is difficulty in breathing with the cough. Most cases of pneumonia in children are accompanied by severe coughing or wheezing, which can cause breathing difficulties.
2. Look at the mental state. When children have pneumonia, their mental state is usually poor, often restless, irritable, or drowsy. They may also experience convulsions.
3. Look at the appetite. When children have a cold, their appetite is usually normal, or they may eat less solid food or drink less milk. However, when they have pneumonia, their appetite significantly decreases, they refuse to eat anything, and they may cry and become restless due to breathlessness.
Cough due to pneumonia: It is mainly characterized by chills, high fever, with body temperature rising to 39°C to 40°C within a few hours. There may be coughing with sputum, and occasionally bloody sputum. The patient may experience shortness of breath, chest pain on the affected side, and aggravated coughing or deep breathing. In severe cases, there may also be symptoms of intoxication such as confusion, restlessness, drowsiness, and cold limbs.
Will a prolonged cough in babies develop into pneumonia?
Coughing does not cause pneumonia, but pneumonia can cause coughing symptoms. Mothers should not get the "cause and effect" relationship confused.
Some mothers may ask, sometimes the baby does cough for a while before developing pneumonia—this is because the baby has a mild infection first, which causes the cough, and then the infection worsens and leads to pneumonia.
If the doctor confirms that the cough is caused by a bacterial infection, targeted antibiotic treatment can control the progression of the disease and may prevent pneumonia from occurring.
However, if the baby's infection is caused by a virus, antibiotics and other drugs will be ineffective. Whether it will develop into viral pneumonia depends solely on the baby's own resistance and their ability to overcome it.
