Our cat and his asthma

Question
Hello. We have an orange male tiger cat that has gotten springtime asthma every year since he was around four years old. He is now nine. He only gets the asthma for about a month and half every spring. Our vet has us give him 5 mg of Prednisone once a day for three days and then gradually reducing it. He also takes 50mg of aminophylline twice a day. This morning we gave him his 5mg of pred and his 50mg of amino. He then had his second 50mg of amino this evening. He has been perfect all day up until a couple of hours ago (hence why I'm still awake). He is coughing and coughing. I just gave him a half of a pred, which is 2.5mg. Is this okay to do? I'm very worried that he may require more of the pred than what the vet is telling us to give him. I spoke with the vet tech today about this and she said that he should be given one 5mg pill once a day for three days, then a half for three days, and then a half every other day. This never seems to be enough for him. Any suggestions as to what we should do? I'm so worried about him and I hate hearing him hacking like this. It sounds just terrible! Thanks!

~Allison

Answer
If it is an allergic asthma, then the treatment is steroids.  With this type of drugs, we need to find the minimum dose that takes away the symptoms.  It may be that 5mg is not enough. It may be that another type of steroid will work betteer in your cat.

I would also advise you to have the chest X-rayed to see if there is any other type of problem present, like fluid buildup in the chest, heart enlargement, or any type of infiltrate in the lungs causing the problems.  Your vet may also want to run a blood count to see if there is any type of inflammation in the lungs.