🌿 Folk Prescriptions

After a cold, many people experience prolonged coughing. Besides a few cases due to secondary infection causing cough, many others result from increased airway sensitivity following viral infection. Triggers such as cold air, unpleasant odors, and dust can provoke coughing. These cases do not respond to antibiotics or cough suppressants; antiallergic drugs or inhaled corticosteroid aerosols can shorten the course. Additionally, atypical bronchiectasis, lung cancer, tuberculosis, etc., may also manifest as chronic cough. Therefore, when encountering cough, one must not automatically treat it as "chronic bronchitis" and indiscriminately use antibiotics and cough suppressants. A careful analysis and necessary examinations are required; only by identifying the cause can treatment be truly effective. A woman in her forties suffered from chronic cough for four to five years. Every time she caught a cold, or encountered cold air, smelled odd odors, or inhaled dust, she would experience severe coughing, sometimes making it impossible to work. She visited multiple hospitals, all diagnosed with chronic bronchitis, but treatments brought no relief. Over time, she became physically and mentally exhausted, depressed. An accidental visit to Beijing led to a specialist suspecting her of having cough-variant asthma. After a series of asthma-related tests, the diagnosis was confirmed. Subsequently, all antibiotics and cough suppressants were discontinued, and she was treated according to asthma management. Her symptoms significantly improved, and after long-term medication, she has had no major episodes for two years. In medicine, cough persisting for more than three weeks, not caused by smoking or clear lung diseases such as pneumonia, lung cancer, or bronchiectasis, is termed chronic cough. Chronic cough can be caused by many conditions. The aforementioned woman’s condition manifests as chronic cough but is fundamentally bronchial asthma. Hospitals with proper facilities can confirm the diagnosis simply by conducting airway reactivity testing and 24-hour peak flow variability measurement. Apart from asthma, gastroesophageal reflux often presents primarily as chronic cough. A female teacher frequently experienced severe coughing during class, nearly unable to teach. Upon consultation, doctors noticed her symptoms included acid regurgitation, heartburn, and upper abdominal pain, suspecting gastroesophageal reflux disease. They performed 24-hour esophageal pH monitoring and endoscopy, confirming the diagnosis. After using medications to inhibit gastric acid and promote gastrointestinal motility, her gastrointestinal symptoms improved, and her cough largely disappeared. In clinical practice, refluxed gastric fluid entering the airways causing severe cough is relatively common. Another common cause of chronic cough is nasopharyngeal disease, especially postnasal drip syndrome—where inflammatory secretions from posterior nasal passages flow into the trachea, triggering severe cough. Patients often feel a sticky sensation in their throat; examination reveals enlarged lymphoid follicles on the posterior pharyngeal wall resembling pebbles. Additionally, chronic rhinitis and sinusitis often accompany chronic cough. Aside from these three categories, recent attention has been drawn to eosinophilic bronchitis and non-specific bronchitis, which can also present as chronic cough. These patients do not respond to antibiotics or cough suppressants but benefit from inhaled corticosteroid aerosols. Diagnosis of these two conditions is more complex, requiring sputum or bronchoalveolar lavage fluid examination.<Cough>