It all started with a simple cough.

“I really didn’t think he had RSV,” says Cathy Caldwell of her 8-month-old son, David.

But then the baby started wheezing.

“Once I heard that wheezing, I called the NurseLine and they told me to go the emergency room,” Ms. Caldwell says.

In the Heartland Regional Medical Center emergency room, doctors put David on oxygen and immediately tested him for RSV. RSV, which stands for Respiratory Syncytial Virus, is the most common cause of bronchiolitis and pneumonia among infants and children under 1 year of age, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

Dr. Michelle Cebulko, pediatrician with Lakeside Pediatrics, said David got sick at what seems to be the peak of this year’s RSV season. Typically, Dr. Cebulko says, the RSV season begins in November and ends in April.

“And this year it happens to be a pretty busy year for us with regard to RSV,” she says.

Doctors in the emergency room diagnosed David with RSV using secretions from his nose. Heartland has a five-minute “rapid test” that scans for the virus.

Because David required oxygen, he was admitted to the Heartland pediatrics ward. Dr. Cebulko says the hospital doesn’t have any current RSV statistics, but she says that the pediatric ward has been at capacity several times in the last few weeks. Nationwide, RSV leads to 120,000 hospitalizations each year.

RSV isn’t just a condition that strikes young children, Dr. Cebulko says. It is just associated with children because they are most likely to suffer complications. RSV is a simple, easily contagious respiratory virus that settles in the lower part of the lungs. Symptoms include a runny nose, persistent cough, low-grade fever, decreased appetite and wheezing in young children.

“These symptoms are just like the common cold for adults,” Dr. Cebulko says, “but for young children it can be serious.”

David spent three days in the pediatrics ward at Heartland. During that time, he received regular breathing treatments as part of what Dr. Cebulko calls, “supportive therapy.” RSV, like other viruses, cannot be cured with medications. Instead, doctors can provide help handling the symptoms while the virus runs its course.

During David’s time in the emergency room, Ms. Caldwell says she left his side only once — to shower.

“I wouldn’t say I was completely calm,” Ms. Caldwell says. “But I had confidence that everything would be fine.”

It was difficult, she says, keeping a baby on oxygen. David hated the nosepiece.

“He thought that was the worst thing they did to him,” she says. “Even in his sleep, he rubbed at the tape.”

When he was released from the hospital, Ms. Caldwell says David was still coughing and wheezing slightly. Nearly a week after being released, David still needed daily inhaler treatments.

Dr. Cebulko says young children with RSV can have symptoms for up to 21 days. RSV, which is transmitted through droplets with virus particles, can live on surfaces for several hours. And children who have RSV can shed the virus for up to four weeks after contracting the illness.

Because the illness is easily transmitted, Dr. Cebulko recommends that children with immune issues, congenital heart defects or who were born prematurely avoid contact with other children during RSV season. But other children, she says, may as well resign themselves to contracting RSV sometime during the season.

Nearly 20 percent of infants will contract RSV during their first year of life. And nearly all children will have had RSV at least once before they turn 3.

Ms. Caldwell knows this all to well. Her school-aged daughter, Abby, had RSV when she was about 10 months old. And nearly every winter she gets the virus again.

“This time, because we’d been through it before, we weren’t totally freaked out as parents,” Ms. Caldwell says. “And from what I hear, it will happen again.”

Lifestyles reporter Betsy Lee

can be reached at betsylee@npgco.com.