Winter is the prime time for viruses and many people spend much of the colder months tucked in bed fighting off illnesses.
One of the most common bugs during this time of the year is the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) but many people do not know a lot about it.
Find out what RSV is and what the most common signs are by reading on.
What is RSV?
RSV is, as it says on the tin, a respiratory illness that affects the windpipe and lungs. It is particularly common between November and February, spreading mainly through sneezes, coughs and touch.
While many might disregard RSV as an annoying cough, it can be very serious in children, and frequently causes bronchiolitis in infants. This accounts for around 20,000 hospital admissions for babies under the age of one.
That is why pregnant women are offered a vaccine to protect their babies once they are born, lowering the risk of severe bronchiolitis by 70 per cent in an infant younger than six months’ old.
What are the signs of RSV?
Unlike a common cold or flu, which often has other symptoms like a runny nose, RSV is characterised mainly by its cough.
Other symptoms include wheezing and shortness of breath, with babies often suffering from fast breathing or being unable to catch their breath.
It is also dangerous for the elderly, and results in hospitalisations of 9,000 or so people over 75 years old every year in the UK. This is because it can flare up existing lung conditions and cause pneumonia.
This is why the vaccination is also available for adults between 75 and 79 to protect them from these potentially dangerous outcomes.
How to tell the difference between RSV and other viruses?
One of the difficulties with diagnosing RSV is that it can appear similar to other viruses that usually occur during winter, including the common cold, flu and Covid-19.
According to the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, however, patients with RSV often suffer from wheezing, whereas this is rare for the other viruses. This is the biggest tell-tale sign that it is RSV.
What’s more, while sufferers may sometimes have a fever, this nearly always happens if you have the flu.
It is also rare to have a sore throat with RSV, unlike with the cold or Covid-19, and patients do not usually have fatigue, whereas they have a high chance of feeling depleted with the other viruses.
Aches are also a rarity among patients with RSV, though they are common with the flu, and frequently occur with Covid-19 and the cold.
Treating RSV
RSV typically goes away on its own within a week, so the best thing patients can do is take medication to relieve their symptoms.
They can speak to their local pharmacy, who can recommend medicines for fever and pain management that they can buy over the counter.
Anyone with RSV should also make sure they drink plenty of fluids to avoid becoming dehydrated.
If the patient is a child or elderly person and the symptoms appear to be getting worse, they are not eating much, they are showing signs of dehydration, they have a temperature of below 36C, and they are having difficulty breathing, it is advisable to call NHS 111 for urgent care.