Reactive Airway Disease or Asthma?

My son is 7 months old. At birth, he aspirated meconium and had a pneumothorax. He was in the NICU for a week.

This winter he has had wheezing twice where you can hear him breathe/wheeze for days and it's accompanied by a loud cough which lingers for weeks. The first time was diagnosed as bronchiolitis and he was given liquid albuterol. I gave it to him for a week, but it didn't seem to do anything to improve his wheezing and cough, so I stopped. He seemed to improve on his own.

The second time his pediatrician diagnosed him with wheezing (although he said it's not really a diagnosis) and prescribed an inhaler of flovent and an inhaler of albuterol along with a spacer (aeromask). I read on the documentation with both drugs that they're not to be given to children under 4 years old, so I haven't given him either one. I'm concerned about giving a child so young an inhaled steroid. Again, his wheezing seems to have improved, although it flares up a bit if we are playing hard.

I have an appointment with a pediatric pulmonologist, but it's not until April (I hate how specialists are always booked out so far in advance!) Any advice in the meantime? It seems like he has reactive airway disease - I've read children who experience meconium aspiration syndrome often have a higher incidence of that. I don't think it truly is asthma, but I'm not sure.

Also, he is in daycare, so I'm sure he'll be sick again and probably have another wheezing episode before the winter is over. I'm worried when we see the specialist in April he'll be over his colds and they won't experience his wheezing.

I would appreciate any help/advice/thoughts anyone has - especially related to giving Flovent to a baby this young. Thanks!

[4boys1girl]

My son became sick for the first time at 12 weeks which now we have come to find out is athsma.  This is not a problem we have on eighter side of our familys so to begin to wonder where it came from is beyond me.  In the beginning my son was a guinie pig.  They were very apprehensive to diagnosis him with asthma because of his age.  I guess you ussully dont see it in babies so young.  He had allergy testing done at 4 months and it showed nothing.  They said they did not expect to see any possitive allergies because agien he was too young.  They thought if he was severely allergic to something it may show up at the age.  They also had him on so many different steroids because nothing seemed to help.  I got really frustrated because they were so free to handing me a perscription for him to another steroid.  HE WAS ONLY 3-4 MONTHS OLD.  The worst part is we would try them and they did not work.  (the oral steroids never helped him)  The doctor did give him a nebulizer and Xopenix .  This is the only thing that we have ever seen any results from.  I remember being in the same frustrating situation you are in.  I made him an appointment and it was weeks away.  My baby would cough so hard at night he would stop breathing.  I finally called the doctor and told him that if he did not do something to figuer this out I was afraid my son was going to die.  Once I started getting crabby I saw things move faster.  I ussually am a very passive person but I was now fighting for one of my children.  I know that if you go to the ER the pulmonalogist will have to see you sooner (in most cases)    On one hand if you have to wait to see a doctor you can assure yourself that he is worth the wait but somethings cant wait.  Call them back and explain that he is sick and see if you can be squeezed in.  Ussually when I would take him to the Dr  this coughing wheezing would be very well behaved.  The pulmonologist did get the pleasure of hearing some of his coughing and a little wheezing but nothing like we were experiencing at 3 am.  He reqested the next time he got bad and it was during office hours to bring him in.  He wanted to see him at his worst.  Maybe try calling your doctors office and explain that this comes and goes and right now he is bad.  Tell them that you want them to see this at it worse.  Or just take him in to the ER.  There a pulmonologist will see him and at least document what he sees.   Explain that you are not scheduled to see your specialist until April and in the mean time someone needs to witness this.  When my son was sick in the beginning he was at the pediatricians office every other day.  I really did not think there was anything they would do different at the ER but looking back I wish I would have taken him in everytime he was sick.  Sometimes it was 4-5 nghts in a row.  I Think that the doctors would have been quicker to believe what I was describing if I had things better documented.  Maybe if we had more exposure we would have gotten better care.  I really trusted the pediatrician we were using then but looking back I think he hindered my sons treatment because he was convinced that he was too young to have asthma.  I hope in some way this helps you ....
Take Care
Kris