Diseases of the upper airways are one of the most common diseases in childhood. Viral infection of the upper airways is usually accompanied by the symptoms arising from the tracheobronchial tree – especially by cough. It is important to state that the cough is not a disease, but the cough is only a symptom. Children with recurrent or persistent cough are usually treated inadequately – by inhaled corticosteroids or other anti asthma drugs without exact diagnosis – they are over diagnosed as having asthma or cough variant asthma, but without examination of bronchial hyperresponsiveness by methacholine inhalation, capsaicin cough challenges, induced sputum or exhaled NO analysis. The main proposal of this paper is to point out strong relationship between the upper and the lower airways and mechanism potentially participating in the mediation and modulation of the cough reflex in children suffering from rhinosinusitis. The paper also characterizes very briefly some of the diseases linked with rhinosinusitis, which is accompanied by cough – bronchial asthma, cough variant asthma, atopic cough, eosinophilic bronchitis and postinfectious cough.

        Key words: nasal cavity, cough, rhinitis, asthma, postinfectious cough