Could it be asthma?

with her 2nd cousins

Hana unfortunately suffering from eczema and mild allergic rhinitis. 

My latest worry is that she has been having daily nocturnal and daytime chesty cough for the last 3 months since her last upper respiratory tract infection. She doesn't have any fever and never wheeze. I would auscultate her lungs on and off and definitely there was no added sound to suggest chest infection or asthma. There was no TB contact either and none of our maids has been coughing or appears thin. Hana's appetite also seemed to be improving off late. 

Could it be that she is having bronchial asthma? This is surely not a clear cut case which makes me scratch my kepala of what medicine to prescribe to my own daughter. I never have faith in cough mixture especially mucolytics.

So finally this mommy doctor decided to give Hana a trial of montelukast in which she has been happily (literally! coz the granules tasted sweet) taking this medication for the last 1 week. So far, I have not seen any positive change in her cough. She even woke up last night, batuk really badly and vomit soon after.

My plan is to wait another week for singulair to have its effect. My next action is a trial of antibiotic to fight off atypical pneumonia. If it doesn't work, I would probably need to start her on inhaler. I'll try to avoid doing chest xray for now. 

Just hope that this expensive drug works!