Cough is one of the most common symptoms for which patients visit to primary care clinicians. Cough can be categorized as acute (<3 weeks in duration), prolonged acute cough (3 to 8 weeks in duration) or chronic (> 8 weeks in duration). The term ‘prolonged acute cough’ in a cough guideline permits a period of natural resolution to occur before further investigations are necessary.

Acute bronchiolitis, a common acute respiratory infection is generally seen in children less than 1 year. These children exhibit symptoms like tachypnoea, crackles, dry cough and audible wheeze, which typically worsen in the acute phase of bronchiolitis before resolving by 14 days. Various studies highlighting therapeutics strategies in decreasing morbidities following acute bronchiolitis revealed that use of either inhaled glucocorticoids or leukotriene antagonists therapy can prevent post-bronchiolitic wheezing or cough during acute bronchiolitis.

Source: Shields MD, Thavagnanam S. The difficult coughing child: prolonged acute cough in children. Cough. 2013;9(1):11. Published 2013 Apr 10.