DEAR DR. GOTT: I am a 19-year-old female and have had a nonproductive cough for 16 months without any other symptoms other than some slight drainage down the back of my throat. I have kept food and cough diaries and cannot find anything that triggers it. I cough when I sit, stand, laugh, after strenuous exercise and around smoke; it seems that I cough all the time.

I have seen my family physician, a nurse practitioner, an ENT, his PA, a pulmonologist and his PA. I have been diagnosed with bronchitis, hiatal hernia, asthma and heartburn. None of the medication given for these diagnoses has worked. I’ve been on Symbicort, Spiriva, codeine, Prilosec, Zantac and one other that I can’t remember the name of. I had to take it for five days for what they thought was bronchitis. I had a chest X-ray done in July 2009 without abnormalities. There is nothing wrong with my vocal chords, either.
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