Nursing & Asthmatic Children With Pneumonia

According to the book "All in One Care Planning Resource," 11 percent of children in the United States under 18 years old, 8.1 million children, have been diagnosed with asthma. Asthma is a chronic obstructive airway disease that may be reversible. A child with asthma may exhibit symptoms of this disease when they are exposed to certain allergens or conditions. Some of these allergens are dust and pets, while conditions that also may trigger asthmatic symptoms are cold weather, physical exertion, some medications and respiratory infections such as pneumonia. Nursing care for the asthmatic child involves finding out what triggered the episode of asthma and targeting nursing interventions towards reducing or eliminating it.

Significance

• An asthmatic child will have difficulty breathing during an episode of asthma. When this condition is exacerbated by pneumonia, which is a respiratory infection, the child's breathing becomes further compromised. Due to the strain put on the child's respiratory system, the nurse ensures that she provides care that addresses factors that affect the child's airways and breathing, among other things.

Effects

• A child experiencing an asthma attack will show some of these early symptoms: breathing changes, sneezing, moodiness, headache, watery or itchy eyes, trouble sleeping and coughing at night. Wheezing, coughing, shortness of breath and difficulty breathing are some late signs of an episode of asthma. An asthmatic child with pneumonia may cough up colored secretions from his lungs, have an elevated temperature and high white blood cell count, and complain of chills and pain when breathing.

Nursing Assessment

• The nurse caring for an asthmatic child with pneumonia will perform assessments that include interviewing his parents to find out when they started noticing his symptoms and what symptoms they saw. The nurse takes the child's vital signs and does a physical exam that will include checking the child's respiratory rate and effort, listening for lung sounds as well as her oxygen-saturation level.The nurse also checks the color and odor of any coughed up sputum and monitors the child's laboratory report for her white blood cell count.

Nursing Interventions

• Important nursing interventions for the asthmatic child with pneumonia address the following problems: ineffective breathing pattern due to swelling of the airways in reaction to an allergen, ineffective airway clearance related to the inability to effectively cough out mucus or secretions in the lungs, and impaired gas exchange because of accumulation of mucus in the lungs as a result of pneumonia. The following nursing care actions can address some of the problems: keeping the head of the child's bed elevated to make breathing easier; administering all prescribed medications, such as antibiotics, to treat the pneumonia; providing respiratory treatments and pain medication; teaching the child deep breathing and coughing exercises; and keeping the child hydrated to loosen up secretions in his lungs by encouraging fluid intake.

Nursing Evaluation

• The nurse evaluates the child to monitor the effectiveness of the nursing interventions he implemented. Successful nursing care for the asthmatic child with pneumonia will have the following outcomes: the child's temperature will be within normal limits, his respiratory rate will return to his normal values, and his white blood cell level will return to normal, indicating the absence of a pneumonia infection. The child's airways will also be free of mucus, and his oxygen saturation will be back to his normal values.