Victoria Marton says she initially thought her 11-year-old son just had a normal cough. Aston got sick with a cough for about a half-week, around mid-October, but it seemed to be getting worse, said the 40-year-old mother from Richmond, Ont. "It was kind of like a barking cough, like it didn't sound good," Marton said as she recounted her family's health scare in a video interview with CTVNews.
ca on Wednesday. "And Sunday night, he was coughing so much that it was waking him up." She decided the next day Aston needed to see his pediatrician and was able to get an appointment.
After getting results back from a chest X-ray, the child was diagnosed with walking pneumonia, the informal name for Mycoplasma pneumonia, Marton said. The Canadian mother shared with CTVNews.ca her family's health scare as medical experts say cases of the disease and other respiratory illnesses have surged, filling up emergency departments nationwide.
Aston got "significantly better" a few days after he took antibiotics that the doctor prescribed to him, she said. Still, he ended up missing nearly two weeks of school while he recovered, Marton said. Marton’s seven-year-old son, Cooper, also contracted walking pneumonia earlier this month and stayed home for a week.
He had a fever of nearly 40 C when he got home from school, which lasted about five days along with a cough, Marton said. Cooper was also prescribed a five-day dose of antibiotics, Marton said. The mother says she was surprised about the di.