Breathlessness? After excercise.

[dpet]

Hi my ds 14 plays football. He came home from practice today complaining of breathlessness. He felt like maybe he had asthma because he said it felt hard to breath. There has never been complaints like this before. Could this be a symptom of pandas or lyme? My daughter who is 18 and suffers also from GABS used to complain of this while running track. Any one have these complaints also?

[cobbiemommy]

We had this complaint and still do. Our is a combination of strep, mycoplasma, bartonella. The mycoplasma is gone, think the strep is toast, now we are just working on the bart.

 

Is your son really active otherwise?? Mine is not, so....

 

Cobbie

[dpet]

Yes he plays football and baseball year round. He has never c/o breathing issues before. My daughter has on several occasions, especially when running long distance. We have an appointment with a ped infectious dz MD in Charlotte NC tomorrow and I will address this symptom with him.

[mdmom]

Go over to the Lyme forum and read under "Helpful Threads" SF Mom's list of Lyme and co-infections symptoms.

 

Breathlessness after minimal exertion is a Lyme symptom

 

Air Hunger, gasping is a Babesia symptom

[smartyjones]

this is very much my own opinion -- i very much consider this a symptom of tick borne illness -- of course, could also be a symptom of other infectious disease also.

 

our experience. . . my younger son was already diagnosed pandas. my older son, 2 summers ago after week at day camp, had green gunk in his nose -- not too bothersome, got over it. a few weeks later, went to baseball camp -- complained that the coaches hassled him too much to 'hustle" while running laps. i didn't pay too much attention. late that fall, he began with many more pandas symptoms -- wouldn't be on a separate level of the house alone, night fears, wouldn't order his own food at a restaurant. we watched and wondered. i made appt with our pandas son integrative MD.

 

around the same time (maybe January), he began basketball -- quick running starts and stops. a few times, he appeared to be having extreme trouble catching his breath. even looked like he may pass out. went to ped. he blew something ridiculously low on the blow meter, had a worrisome pulsox. dr diagnosed "exercise induced asthma" -- gave an inhalor, made appts for chest x-ray, blood work, EKG. x-ray fine, blood work showed high strep ASO, lyme neg. EKG showed something to investigate further. did expensive doppler echo which showed minor murmur, cardiologist not worried and saw it as one seen that is not uncommon for kids.

 

at same time, integrative MD did a type of energy testing -- diagnosed trouble with strep, lyme, i don't have in front of me but i think also erchlicia, bartonella, maybe also babesia. treated wtih homeopathy.

 

as far as ped is concerned (and i think ped is a helpful part of our team with younger son and quite progressive -- but still a general ped) he has exercise induced asthma and should use an inhaler - likely will be life troublesome. after a few months (5-6 ish) of integrative treatment, he showed great improvement.

 

that spring at the beginiing of baseball training, he could not keep up with the other kids running the outside of the field, even with inhaler. he told me then that at camp last summer, that he couldnt' keep up. also showed trouble relating to the coaches and kids, many of which he'd played with the last two years.. we thought we'd have to pull him from the team. luckily, we had great supportive coaches who were willing to take what he could give and saw the value of keeping him in an activity he liked and with friends. he ended the season, a full part of the team and pitched the last two winning games. he used the inhaler deffnitley the beginning of the season, likely still used but less in the end. fall baseball, didn't use the inhaler.

 

the past winter basketball, he again seemed to have trouble and used the inhaler. with integrative MD, he was again showing trouble with a few viruses. he's young and sports are important to him, so we use the inhaler when he seems to need it. if he were older, i think it would likley be good to not use it and see the breathing as a canary for infectious trouble.

[JuliaFaith]

My son had similar issues. You can see on my signature line all the things he has been treated for so might give you an idea.

[keepfighting]

My son had this complaint and I took him to a cardiologist. He was diagnosed with an innocent heart murmur that suddenly appeared out of know where. He was just diagnosed with Pans on yesterday which was triggered by mycoplasma pneumonia. I read that pneumonia brings on asthma like symptoms. He also had a drag cough when he was younger but was never tested for pnemonia.

[Hopeny]

Hi sorry for thr late add but we have been dealing with asthma with my daughter. The pediatrician COMPLETELY misdiagnosed Exercise Induced Asthma and mistreated it and had DD using albuterol on a daily basis which is extremely unhealthy/dangerous if not required. She had an emergency situation (looking back now I believe was caused by ehrlicia or rocky mountain spotted fever,maybe myco, didn't know at the time) and we were forced to see a pulmonologist. Upon testing discovered that DD did not have EIA, but actually has full blown asthma. It is very difficult to manage because due to Lyme I need to keep her off steriods. However, I have found that using a nebulizer is extremely helpful when DD gets sick and knock wood have been able to get her well during flares with just the neb. One thing the pulmonologist told me that has been very helpful in managing this, breathlessness is not a sign of asthma, wheezing, airways seizing up, and coughing are. Breathlessnes is a different issue. Same as with with Lyme and PANDAS, pediatricians mistreat/misdiagnose asthma as well, breathlessness is not a sign of asthma. Very glad we ended up seeing the pulmonologist.

[smartyjones]

hopeny -- interesting b/c when i was writing my reply i was on vaca with my mom -- a retired nurse. she asked why when all that was going on with my son did the ped send him to a cardiologist instead of a pulmonologist. she didn't really think of it at the time but now it seems odd to her that we didn't go to a pulmonologist. how did you end up at one?

 

 

i do think my son's issues were infectious based and we see the integrative MD who treated him with good results. i wonder if i should investigate a pulmonologist just to check out his lungs?

[Hopeny]

My daughter was misdiagnosed and untreated for what I now think was Lyme in april 2010. she also had been dxd with EIA in January of that year by our pediatrician.In July of 2010, she began to have massive coughing and breathing issues, it went on for a full 6-7 weeks and I was loading her up on albuterol, prednisone and flovent which made it worse. I had something like 10 office visits, they would not give me antibiotics insisting it was viral. Sorry but I have to add, idiots! After all of my research I now think it was ehrlicia or the RMSF she has now tested + for. I am fortunate she made it through this. I had her sleeping in my room because she was so ill, at 5 am I woke up she was gasping for air unable to breath. After the first gasp, no sound. I was terrified, screaming. She started breathing. Gave albuterol again. Ped finally said to go to pulmonoligist, he did x rays. He said he thought it was a bad sinus infection/drip causing all the mucus. I BEGGED pediatrican for antibiotics, promising I would stop if it did not work, they gave her a z-pac. She got better in 24 hours, then it came back after abx was finished. Ped relcutantly gave 10 days of Zith, then the thing went away. DD had subsequent full pulmonology testing/workup maybe 6 weeks following and was dxd with asthma, not EIA. Pulmonologist put her on inhaled steriods, she became depressed. Took her off, she got better. Happened twice, in the context of Lyme/PANDAS I now understand this but did not at the time. So now I just try to manage her with the neb (and I pray!). I honestly don't really like our pulmonologist, but what I learned from this experience is that general doctors are just that, generalists, and they just don't have the experience or training to treat, they just loaded up my DD on albuterol. The only real way to diagnose asthma is to have the full pulmonology testing which takes 1-2 hours. Otherwise a doctor is just guessing, and when using something as powerful as albuterol my two cents is that it is important to know for certain before you use a medication like that. To add one more element, pulmonologist says if DD needs to use inhaler, she needs to stop activity and to rest. No puffing and going back into the activity, if a real asthma attack it is extremely serious.

Edited August 24, 2012 by Hopeny

[bulldog24]

the tickborne infection Babesia can cause "air hunger" I would check into it. There is babesia Microti and Babesia Duncani check for both.

[kos_mom]

Identifying an asthma attack is actually very difficult unless you have some equipment. My DD was dx'ed with asthma five years ago. Initially she was put on the asthma medication but the allergist insisted that we keep checking in so we could get her off as soon as feasible. We were able to do so when her severe sinus condition cleared up after two surgeries. Thereafter, I viewed asthma as a mere footnote to everything else; she continued to carry a rescue inhaler, which she seldom used.

 

She had severe pneumonia in May, which I guess weakened her lungs. In July I had to take her to the ER twice. The first time she felt chilled and tingling all over but no fever and she demanded to go to the ER. It turns out she was having a bad asthma attack, which they could tell from her racing heart, blood oxygen level,and wheezing in her lungs. The second time she had chills and a 103 fever and her lips turned blue--I though from the chills. I could barely get her to the ER--all she wanted to do was lie down. Again, turned out to be a severe asthma attack. In neither case would I have guessed asthma was the problem (well I guess not the fever--still think that was strep although ER doc wouldn't test--her titers came in sky high two days later).

 

A friend of mine who has asthma says he doesn't know when he is in the danger zone--he has to use a peak flow meter to determine that. He also uses a little gadget that you put on your finger that measures your blookd oxygen and heart rate. When the former drops to a certain point and the latter rises above a certin point you are in trouble and need to get help. He gave one to my daughter.

 

Another cause of shortness of breath is vocal chord dysfunction--the vocal chords fold together when they are supposed to open. It usually appears in adolescence. A lot of exercise induced asthma is actually VCD. It doesn't seem to be very well understood; it could be exercise induced and sometimes appears related to anxiety, as well as other things. A fair number of people with VCD also have asthma, making it more difficult to distinguish what might be causing an acute problem. The treatment is breathing exercises--good luck getting a teenager to do that. My DD had what seemed like an asthma attack once when we wre on a cruise and conveniently happened to be with a pediatric pulmonologist--she coached her through it and later told me she thought it might have been VCD. We reported this to the ENT who suggested a voice coach whom DD refused to see again after the first visit. So another footnote to everything else. Maybe VCD will show up someday in lists as a symptom associated with PANDAS.