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 “First and foremost, we want parents to know that no matter what, most viral infections will get better in 3 to 5 days, and go away completely within 2 weeks,” says Dr. Dennis Kuo, a pediatrician at the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center in Baltimore, MD. “The second thing they need to remember is fluids, fluids, fluids.” More advice from Johns Hopkins: > Give your child plenty of fluids. > Avoid giving straight water to children under 6 months because their kidneys are not mature enough to handle too much water. > To help relieve congestion, use saline nasal drops up to 4 times a day and a cool-mist humidifier at night. > Use baby acetaminophen to relieve high fever in infants older than 3 months. > Use children’s ibuprofen to take down high fever in children over 6 months. Typically, a temperature over 101 is considered a high fever, but tolerance varies from child to child. Follow your gut on this one. > Don’t over-wrap a feverish infant and don’t cover the face and head. Over-wrapping prevents proper cooling. Call a pediatrician if: > Your child younger than 3 months and has a fever over 100.4 when taken rectally. > Your child over 3 months has a fever higher than 104 when it is taken rectally. > Your child hasn’t had a wet diaper in 6 hours – a sign of dehydration. Other signs of dehydration include dry mouth, fussiness and producing few or no tears when crying. > Your child’s symptoms don’t improve in 3 to 5 days. > Your child is lethargic, particularly with NO fever present. > Your child is unusually cranky and does not calm down when picked up and held. > Your child’s breathing is rapid or labored. > Your child refuses to drink. “If a baby refuses to drink, your alarms should go off because it may mean that she is having trouble breathing.” Kuo says. “If a child is forced to choose between breathing and drinking, breathing comes first.” Remember, antibiotics don’t treat viral infections, such as the flu or common cold, only bacterial ones, such as strep throat, sinus and ear infections, and bacterial pneumonia. However, a viral infection makes a child more susceptible to bacterial invaders, so see your pediatrician if your child’s symptoms don’t improve after a week. Infant cold and cough medicines were taken off drugstore shelves recently amid growing concern over adverse effects caused by overdoses in children younger than 2 years. A Baltimore group, led by Johns Hopkins Children’s pediatricians, spearheaded the original effort to alert consumers and push the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to ban the marketing of such medicines for children under 6. Kathy Sena is a freelance journalist specializing in health and parenting issues, and is the mother of a 12-year-old son. Visit her blog at parenttalktoday.com. --- SIDE BAR --- Obesity and too little sleep The surprising connection Children who get less sleep in third and sixth grades are more likely to be overweight in sixth grade, according to the results of a recent study from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. The data focused on kids’ reported sleep problems, sleep duration and Body Mass Index (BMI). Sixth-graders with shorter nightly sleep durations (fewer than 9 hours) were more likely to be overweight. And third grade students who got less sleep, regardless of their BMI at the time, also were more likely to become overweight when they reached sixth grade. For every additional 1 hour of sleep in sixth grade, a child was 20% less likely to be overweight. Every additional hour of sleep in third grade resulted in a 40% decrease in the child’s risk of being overweight in sixth grade. |
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