A Bump in the Road

A Bump in the Road

(before we've even left the driveway)

“But you haven’t even STARTED Oral Immunotherapy yet,” you say.  “How could you POSSIBLY ALREADY have a bump in the road?”

Well, we're just special like that, I guess!  Brendan has asthma.  It is usually no big thing around here.  He has flare ups maybe twice a year—once in the fall during weed pollen season and once in the spring during tree pollen season.  His asthma was so well controlled that last summer, his allergist suggested that we remove his daily inhaled steroid completely and see how he does with NO asthma meds.  The answer?  Fine.  Until four days before we are scheduled to see Dr. Silvers about starting oral immunotherapy.  Yep.  He has timing.

So this happened-- just a few days before our first visit with Dr. Silvers.
Coincidence?!  I think not.  Sometimes I has the dumb :(. 

There are only two reasons someone can’t start OIT: a condition called eosinophilic esophagitis and uncontrolled asthma.  So, on April 8, my wheezy, coughing child traveled to Dallas hoping to pass a pulmonary function test that afternoon and begin OIT the VERY NEXT DAY.  Instead of ending our April 8 visit with a pulmonary function test, we finished with a nebulizer treatment and were sent home on a slew of asthma meds to control the flare.  A new date was set to begin OIT: April 30.

We decided to try a pulmonary function test here in Houston first before we traveled all the way to Dallas again.   We gave the asthma meds religiously.  We ordered a peak flow meter and practiced breathing into it.  We weaned off the rescue inhaler and oral steroids as he improved.  On April 23, Brendan took a Pulmonary Function Test at a local pulmonologist’s office, and the results came back NORMAL!  

Our bump in the road is beginning to smooth out.  T-4 days before we begin OIT.  Should I keep Brendan in a bubble until then?  I've thought about it.