Treatment of croup

PREVIEW

The word “croup” is thought to be derived from an old Scottish word for croak, as in the sound of a raven. Could it be that Edgar Allan Poe had been up for a couple nights with a croupy child when, upon a midnight dreary as he pondered, weak and weary, he thought he heard a raven cry “Nevermore”? The desperate-sounding cough of croup often starts up in the night in a child who had only moderate symptoms of infection the day before, and it brings anxious families to the emergency department or office. Dr Folland summarizes the steps to take to ensure rapid and full recovery.