Asthma

As many of you know, HL was officially diagnosed with Asthma in November. He was put on the preventative Pulmicort which is an inhaled powder steroid. Within a week, he no longer needed his albuterol, and he had stopped his dry coughing that he's had for years. As he had always had this dry cough, we just figured it was the dry air here and never really thought twice about it. Apparently, it was asthma all along. Anyway, due to premiums increasing to ungodly levels, we had to change the boys' health insurance coverage. We found a policy that cut the monthly premium in half, but they refuse to cover any medications that are not generic. Fine. Then, we discover that there are no generic medications to treat asthma; the Pulmicort he was on costs $130/month. Not so fine. When we told his doctor this, he gave us several weeks worth of another preventative (Singulair) in samples. HL does okay on this, but not as well as he did on the Pulmicort. On Monday, we took HL to an asthma specialist who was nonplussed by the fact that our insurance was refusing medications. By doing that, he says, the insurance company increases the risk of having to pay hospitalization costs. Their shortsighted frugalness will only backfire. He gave us several more weeks of samples and promised to write a letter to the insurance telling them just how ridiculous they are being. Oh, it feels good to have him on our side. He seems like a really great guy! One more little thing about asthma- AW seems to have had his first asthma attack this past Sunday night. Splendid, eh? He was sleeping with us in our bed, then woke up with a start, gasping for air. He sounded croopy to me, so I did the shower steam therapy which helped a little but not much. Then, I took a chance and gave AW two puffs of HL's albuterol. That did the trick. He was breathing well enough to fall back asleep. Perhaps we taught HL to share a bit too well...