Understanding bronchitis - symptoms

What are the symptoms of bronchitis?

The symptoms for acute bronchitis include:

• Hacking cough.
• Yellow, white, or green phlegm, usually appearing 24 to 48 hours after cough begins.
• Fever, chills.
• Soreness and tightness in chest.
• Some pain below breastbone during deep breathing
• Some shortness of breath

The symptoms for chronic bronchitis are:

• Persistent cough producing yellow, white, or green phlegm (for at least three months of the year, and for more than two consecutive years).
• Sometimes wheezing, sometimes breathlessness.

Seek medical advice if:

• Your cough is so persistent or severe that it interferes with sleep or daily activities or leads to persistent chest pain; you could be damaging sensitive air sacs in your lungs.
• Your symptoms last more than a week, and your mucus becomes darker and thicker, increases in volume, or turns bloody.
• You display symptoms of acute bronchitis and have chronic lung or heart problems, or are infected with the virus that causes AIDS; respiratory infections can leave you vulnerable to more serious lung diseases, such as pneumonia.
• You have great difficulty breathing. This may be a symptom of a medical condition such as asthma, emphysema or heart disease.