There are many causes of cough, and there is no correlation in judging the severity of cough alone based on whether it is dry cough or sputum. Generally speaking, dry cough is mainly seen in non-infectious cough; wet cough, that is, sputum cough is more common with infectious cough, especially those with more sputum and purulent sputum, respiratory infectious diseases should be considered first. Let's take a look at what respiratory diseases may be behind these two cough symptoms?
What are the usual diseases of dry cough, and does it matter?
There are many possible diseases that can cause dry cough, if you mainly manifest as a stimulating dry cough, usually cough is more intense, cough at night and in the early morning is an important feature, cold air, dust and oil smoke and other dry cough that is easy to induce or aggravate should be considered as cough variant asthma, which requires long-term inhalation hormone therapy to avoid developing into typical asthma.
Some coughs occur during the day, and eosinophilic bronchitis should be considered if it is also sensitive to fumes, dust, odor, or cold air, and symptoms will be significantly reduced with hormone therapy. If there is a harsh dry cough, mostly paroxysmal, coughing during the day or at night, oil smoke, dust, cold air, speech, etc. are easy to induce cough, often accompanied by itchy throat, at this time may suffer from a varied cough, glucocorticoids or antihistamines are effective. Early bronchopulmonary cancer may also present as a pungent dry cough without sputum or less sputum, which can be exacerbated by bronchial stenosis caused by the tumor, and is mostly persistent. If you take ACEI (an Acetin-converting enzyme inhibitor) antihypertensive drugs, you can also cause a dry cough, which is an adverse reaction to the drug, and the symptoms can be relieved after stopping the drug. In addition, chronic pharyngitis can also cause a dry cough.
If the cough is more sputum, most of them are infectious manifestations, and there are many diseases that can cause wet coughs, we will see:
1. Pneumonia: the main symptoms are cough and sputum, fever, or aggravation of original respiratory symptoms. There are many causes of pneumonia, caused by bacterial, atypical pathogens, viral, fungi, etc., and it is necessary to treat the cause after a clear diagnosis.
2. Acute-chronic bronchitis: dry cough or a small amount of mucus sputum at the beginning, followed by increased sputum volume, cough intensified, cough, cough sputum can continue for 2-3 weeks, if it does not heal, it can evolve into chronic bronchitis, usually for more than 2 years, accumulated or sustained for at least 3 months per year. Cough and sputum are generally obvious in the morning, coughing up white foamy sputum or mucus sputum, and there is also a night cough during aggravation, and the cough is mainly in winter and spring. Usually an acute attack due to infection with an associated bacterial pathogen can be treated with sensitive antibiotics.
3. Bronchiectasis: clinical manifestations are chronic cough, large amount of coughing up pus and sputum and intermittent hemoptysis, often combined with chronic sinusitis. Different stages of the disease can be treated with inhaled hormones or combination with long-acting beta2 agonists and intravenous sensitive antibiotics.
4. Tracheal-bronchial tuberculosis: the main symptoms are chronic cough, sputum, which can be accompanied by symptoms of tuberculosis poisoning such as low-grade fever, night sweats, and emaciation, and cough in some patients is the only clinical manifestation. Anti-TUBERCULO therapy should be made after diagnosis.
5. Bronchial lung cancer: cough, sputum with blood or coughing up blood are common symptoms of central lung cancer, of course, this should be combined with long-term smoking history, CT examination and bronchoscopy and other clear diagnosis. You don't have to see similar symptoms and lean up, scare yourself, find the symptoms and get a clear diagnosis as early as possible is the wisest choice.
If severe dry cough or frequent cough affects rest and sleep, antitussive drugs can be given appropriately. Patients with sputum should be treated with expectorant drugs.
Understanding these, it is very one-sided to judge the severity from whether it is dry cough or sputum, and the symptoms found should be treated in time to clarify the diagnosis, so as to treat the symptoms symptomatically.
Author | Hu Tianxin Clinical Pharmacist Member of Pharmaceutical Affairs Network
bibliography:
Asthma Group of respiratory disease branch of Chinese Medical Association. Guidelines for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Cough (2015)
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