Hi,

I'm writing for some advice on whether the asthma symptoms my son (3
years, 9 months old) is experiencing could be caused by completing the
relatively short courses of Prednisolone.

He was on Becotide inhaler for about 6 months (200mg/day) and pretty
much OK, we only occasionally used the Salbutamol inhaler (maybe once
or twice a week). About 7 weeks ago he got his first asthma attack
while on steroid inhaler. The GP prescribed 2 days of 20mg
Prednisolone (plus a nebulizer dose). He was OK for a few days but got
worse again and was prescribed 2 more days 20mg of Prednisolone. He
was again fine for few days but the asthma came back in a much sever
form (the nebulizer not really having any effect) and ended up in
hospital for 4 days (needing oxygen). There he was prescribed 5 days
of 30mg Prednisolone and the steroid inhaler was changed to Flixotide
(500mg/day) which doesn't seem to work well either. He was also given
amoxyciline but they weren't sure there is a chest infection (X-rays
didn't show any problem).

Two weeks after getting out of hospital he got another attack and the
GP prescribed 5 more days of 20mg Prednisolone. They worked but a week
after completing he got another attack and went to A&E. The doctors
now prescribed 7 days of 30mg Prednisolone.

We'll see an asthma specialist in a week time but does the above sound
like Prednisolone withdrawal symptoms? I mentioned this to the doctors
in A&E but it looked more like they wanted him to be fine for one more
week until we see the specialist. It seems that the "short" courses of
Prednisolone get longer and longer and are worried of side effects,
especially at this age.

Thank you,

Catalin