Sinus and upper Respitory

[Eanndunn59]

I am a 52 year old female who for 3 years has been struggling with upper respitory/sinusitus.  I  am ill every 30 to 60 days.  Symptoms start with headache followed by congestion in my nose, nasal dripping in back of throat and chest congestion.   The congestion  builds to the point where I can't talk or difficult for people to understand me.  When I call the doctor he prescribes a 7 day course of antibiotic and I am better for about 30 to 45 days.  I work with pulmonary doctor who sees me for asthma and I use Advair 500/50 along with Allegra D and Singulair and I do regular sinus rinses.  I was also sent to see a sinus specialist at University of Iowa who removed a large polyp from left Maxillary.  I was hoping after the surgery the symptoms would clear.  The surgery was completed in 8/2011 and I've had two flare up since that time.  I've been tested for allergies 4 times and the only allergen is cut grass.   I live in Upper Illinois and it appears the last year and this year I've been more sick in November and December when there is no cut grass.  This is a problem as each time  I experience fever, malaise, weakness and miss 2 -3 days of work.  Currently from the last episode I am on 875Mg of Amoxiclaven for 7 days and I still don't feel well and people can still I am still congested and coughing.  I've been on prednisone therapy several times.  I've been tested for Lupus and Wegners and they are negative.   I'm active and have 8 grandchildren and I don't want to be sick plus my employers are having a hard time with my absence.  What I should be doing to find the right information and find the solution

[RussHuge]

That's what happened when air so dirty brought to you by republicans. You can't do anything about it but cleaning the air.

[tschock]

How terribly awful for you to have to suffer through this.
Hubby, our two youngest sons, and I, all get this every year...twice a year actually...just before it snows, and when it melts. We are all allergic to mold...snow mold to be more precise.
You're doing all the right things it seems...and your doctor does seem to be concerned, but it seems they just can't pinpoint it for you.
Ask your doctor if snow mold is one of the things they checked you for...quite often it is overlooked.
Of course that doesn't solve the rest of the year's problems...except perhaps it's because of the cut grass allergy.
We have post nasal drip/congestion year round, but only cough and choke in spring and fall when the snow mold appears.( the asthma symptoms)

Is it possible that it isn't only asthma? Could it be COPD as well? Not sure how many tests they did on you, sorry.
Because of your age, I'm wondering if the allergist didn't tell you that adult allergies can change on a constant basis?  Here in Canada they seem to dislike testing adults because of this. I have been trying for years to get tested...but they keep telling me that I'm too old. I've been trying since I was 25 to get tested...they keep telling me that it takes 2 years to get an adult in for testing...if they would have signed me up for them years ago, I would know them all by now. lol
All I can do is keep records of what I eat, breath in, etc to try and determine what it is that keeps me plugged up all year long. Have only determined a handful of things over the years...what a pain. lol
My third oldest son started coughing the day he was born. They would give him antibiotics etc every two months...until he was 5 and a real pediatrician saw him and concluded that it was asthma. He was fine for several years on the inhalers...now he's sick all the time again. We can't figure it out.
We're going to start keeping records for him of what he eats, etc.
I recommend you do the same thing...it's possibly the only thing that might help.
Make a list of everything you ingest...when your symptoms worsen you can look through the list and see what it was that you ate/drank in a 24 hour period. Cut those things out of your diet for a week or so and see if you improve. It's hard, but so worth it when you suffer all the time.
Good luck and keep us updated.