Sensitive cough suffered by females

According to this new study it shows that women are more sensitive to stimuli that produce a cough.Researchers in the US investigated a group of 60 women and 30 men attending an outpatient clinic for chronic cough. They had them inhale substances that cause a cough through a mouthpiece for one second. Then they counted the number of coughs produced by the participants over the next ten seconds.

The substances used were capsaicin, the hot substance in red peppers, and citric acid. The women needed far less of each 'cough challenge' - as the substances were called - to induce coughing. The difference between the genders was independent of cigarette smoking and the kind of cough being treated at the clinic. The study suggests that women have a more sensitive cough reflex than men to. Similar differences have been found in the onset of asthma and gastroesophagal reflux disease.