Bronchiolitis or “Wheezy Bronchitis” and Kids
One of the more common illnesses that is encountered during the winter months in infants and young children is a respiratory problem referred to as Bronchiolitis or “wheezy bronchitis”. This is a condition caused by a viral infection that attacks the respiratory tree, both upper (nose and throat) and lower (the smaller airways leading to the air sacks in the lungs). It is most commonly caused by RSV or Respiratory Syncitial Virus. It can also be caused by other winter time viral infections but the exact cause is relatively unimportant as the symptoms are nearly the same.
Your child will usually develop signs and symptoms of a regular cold with sneezing, runny nose, mild cough, and sometimes a low grade fever. At this stage it will be impossible to tell if this will progress to bronchiolitis, but most of the time this will remain a cold and your “cures” are limited as your doctor will tell you. In a certain number of infants and young children, after a few days of the cold, the cough might progress to a more significant stage and the infant or young child may show some signs of having difficulty breathing; more rapid breathing rate than normal will usually be the first of such signs, but fever alone can raise an infant’s rate of breathing, and if you are unsure call your baby’s Doctor and he/she will help you figure that out.
Because the primary problem with bronchiolitis is swelling in the respiratory passages (lower and upper), air might have to begin to squeeze through narrower passages in the lungs and similar to what we have presented about asthma in the past, this may lead to wheezing. Wheezing is a whistling (musical) type of noise when your child breathes out versus noisy breathing in noticed in those infants with the upper airway cold. Admittedly this may be difficult to see by non- medical parents, but you can ask your Doctor how to do this in a reliable and repeatable manner.
Most infants and young children will remain in this stage and, as long as he/she is feeding well , does not have fever over 103, and seems fairly cheerful with his/her usual skin color, you do not need to worry, and all the symptoms will resolve as the cold goes away.
Occasionally, the situation can worsen with more difficulty breathing, now showing itself by your child using more muscles of his/her body to help force the air through the small airways in the chest: those muscles might include the abdominal, neck and intercostals (muscles between the ribs). At this stage your child should certainly be under the care of a physician, who might, depending on the appearance of your child admit him/her to the hospital so that more intensive care can be used to help him/her breathe.
The illness is self limited in that between 3 and 7 days normal resolution will take place. The worsening progression that I outlined above will generally not happen very fast and you will have time to see that your child is getting worse. Anywhere along the way, should you have doubts about your ability to adequately monitor your child’s status you should be talking to his/her Doctor.
I would like to stress once again that most bronchiolitis illnesses in infants and young adults remains mild and in fact may be indistinguishable from a normal cold.
Kids’ Cold Medications and Tooth Decay
As the winter season comes quickly upon us, so does cold and flu season. For parents, that usually means caring for kids with runny noses and coughs. When your child comes down with an illness, you want to do everything you can to help them get better. Over-the-counter medicines are usually a go-to for easing their symptoms. While they help in suppressing coughs and colds, these medications can have a side effect you may have never considered before: tooth decay.
If your child is like most, he or she probably prefers sweet-tasting liquid medicine as opposed to pills. And this is understandable, as pills can be difficult for young children to swallow. But those sweet cough syrups are sweet for a reason. They contain a high amount of sugar, which bacteria in the mouth feed on. This breaks down the enamel of your child’s teeth, which then leads to decay. Citric acid is another ingredient that is commonly found in liquid medicines. This can also wear down tooth enamel and increase the risk of cavities. Additionally, the ingredients in liquid medicine can dry out your child’s mouth. Saliva helps rinse away cavity-causing sugars and acids. But a dry mouth means less saliva to fight off decay.
The good news is that there are several things you can do to reduce your child’s risk for tooth decay when taking medication:
- Give your child medicine before breakfast, lunch or dinner as opposed to bedtime. When medicine is taken at bedtime, the sugars will remain in contact with your child’s teeth longer while they are sleeping, which can be very destructive. Eating also helps produce more saliva, so meal time is the perfect time to take medicine.
- Be sure that your child brushes his or her teeth and rinses thoroughly after taking medicine. This will help get rid of any remaining sugars in the mouth.
- As your child gets older and is able to swallow pills, start weaning them off liquid medicines and choose the pill form instead.
Help your child stay healthy this season by monitoring not only their immune system, but their dental health as well. By following these tips, you can help reduce your child’s risk of tooth decay when taking cough syrups and other liquid medications.
Quick Feel-Good Cold Remedies for Kids
As you probably know, there’s no cure for the common cold. And it’s hard to prevent, especially in children who are in school or daycare. Keeping your home’s germ hotspots clean and boosting your child’s immune system with plenty of sleep helps. Even so, few moms get through the sneezin’ season without having to deal with at least one bout of sniffles and a sore throat.
So what home remedies can you use to help a sick child feel better?
1. Offer an ice pop.
Water, juice, warm broth or lemon water with honey can help loosen congestion and keep your sick one hydrated. (Just don’t give honey to infants.) If your child’s throat hurts so much you can’t convince him to drink, offer an ice pop instead.
2. Create a steam room.
Cold viruses thrive in dry conditions, which is part of the reason why colds are more common in winter. Mucus membranes will dry in dry air conditions, which can cause a nose to be stuffy and throat to be scratchy. To help loosen mucus, have your child sit in a steamy bathroom for 10 minutes before bedtime. A humidifier can also help; just be sure to keep it clean, otherwise it can make mold spores spread, doing more harm than good. Change the water every day and follow the manufacturer’s cleaning instructions carefully.
3. Get them to gargle.
This can be hard to do with a younger child, but if you have a tween or teen, suggest she gargle twice a day with warm salt water (1/2 teaspoon of salt mixed into 1 cup warm water).
4. Heed Grandma’s advice.
As for her famous chicken soup remedy, good news: It’s a valid meal choice for a child with a cold. Studies have shown that both the homemade and canned varieties have anti-inflammatory properties, easing swollen nasal membranes. Plus, it’s another (tasty) way of helping your child get valuable fluids, and it can replace lost sodium if your child is vomiting or has diarrhea.
5. Try saline nasal drops and sprays.
Combat stuffiness and congestion with over-the-counter saline nasal sprays and drops. For a baby, squirt a few drops of saline solution in your baby’s nasal passages, then gently suction with a rubber bulb syringe. This is important, as babies are “obligate nose breathers,” meaning they have not yet learned to open their mouths to breathe when their nose is stuffed.
6. Watch for signs of strep.
If your child’s sore throat is accompanied by a fever, headache or chills, or her discomfort seems extreme, give her pediatrician a call. It might be strep throat, a bacterial infection that you’ll need antibiotics to treat.
Sniffle-Fighting Snacks for You and Your Kids
Ah, fall. The leaves are changing, the mercury is dropping and … the air is filling with the sound of sneezes and coughs. With the average kid coming down with a cold eight to 10 times a year, it’s no wonder that you’re trying your hardest to keep your family healthy.
Along with enforcing hand-washing rules, also try adding immune-boosting nutrients. Snacks are the perfect opportunity to sneak in an extra serving, so stock up on the following foods – so you can sidestep those sniffles this season.
1. Yogurt: This creamy treat is packed with healthy probiotics, the “good” kind of bacteria. According to a study published in the British Journal of Nutrition, students who had a probiotic drink daily for three months as half as many sick days as those who got a placebo drink.
2. Oats: A bowl of oatmeal is a quick and filling snack. Plus, oats are high in beta-glucans, a compound that can fend off the sniffles. According to German scientists, those who were given beta-glucan daily for 26 weeks had 13 percent fewer sick days than those who weren’t. Want your kids to gobble up their oats? Bake them into delicious low-fat cookies.
3. Pumpkin seeds: Half a cup of these crunchy seeds deliver 41 percent of all of the zinc you need in a day. Research shows that zinc may stop viruses from spreading in the body, shortening the duration of the cold or flu. Try mixing them into yogurt, adding them to trail mix or whipping up a homemade granola bar, such as this five-minute recipe.
4. Berries: Not only are they high in vitamin C, but berries are also loaded with antioxidants. These nutrients protect against the damage that can wear down the immune system. Eat those berries out of hand, or add them to that bowl of yogurt or oatmeal.
5. Tea: Whether you prefer green or black, or iced or hot, brew up some benefits with this drink. In a study from Harvard University, people who sipped black tea for two weeks had 10 times the amount of a cold-fighting protein called interferon than those who didn’t. Experts believe that a type of antioxidants in tea, catechins, may kill of viruses. So put on that kettle!
6. Spinach: It’s no secret that this dark leafy green is good for you. But it packs a particular punch against colds, containing vitamins C, E and B6 – three nutrients shown to rev up your immunity. Can’t get your kids to eat spinach? Think again: Try whipping up a tasty smoothie from a frozen banana, orange juice and a handful of spinach. Except for the green color, they won’t even realize they’re sipping up their greens!
It’s Fall and My Child Won’t Stop Sneezing – Ask a Pediatrician
Just when you and your children have made it through the summer with all the allergic sneezing and coughing seen mostly at the beginning of the summer, Fall arrives and is ushered in by ragweed season. Here we go again: watery itchy eyes, sneezing, runny itchy nose, etc. Now throw in the contact between children of like ages occurring in school rooms across the country and what is a parent to think? Is this allergy, or might it be a cold? Good question, but in fact it makes very little difference if your child is otherwise healthy and feeling well.
While it is true you will begin to see infectious agents causing this situation, this is a child who need not be kept out of school and who need not necessarily be given any medicine to “cure the cold” (there are no existing medicines to cure a cold). There is a certain period of being contagious regardless of the effects of medicines on the symptoms for every infectious disease. In school aged children most of these illnesses are viral in nature and are very similar in their symptoms to allergic issues.
The contagious period often begins before the symptoms begin and are unaffected by the use of medications!
Regardless what many parents believe, I truly believe that “treatment” is only needed if the symptoms appear to be greatly influencing the life of the child; that is, interfering with appetite, sleeping, playing or school work. Unless that occurs, one is treating insignificant symptoms, such as cough, or fever and more to the advantage of the parents than the child. All medications have side effects and the over-the-counter cold preparations usually contain several medications of differing pharmaceutical classes; each designed to relieve a certain symptom, e.g. cough, runny nose, fever, etc. Most of the time your child does not need all features of these medications (but that’s the only way it comes) and side effects can occur.
Add to that the fact that even using the exactly correct medicine for the symptom, the over-the-counter medication is not liable to achieve the desired result. Also a good proportion of symptoms at this time of year may be allergy related and will respond even poorer to the over the counter cold medicines.
Other posts will deal with such issues as fever and use of antibiotics, but for now, you should be equally concerned about what goes into your child’s body whether that is foods or relatively useless medicines. Remember, as a parent, whether you sleep well at night or not is not as important as whether your child is perfectly comfortable even though there may be an annoying cough that you are listening to very intently all night.
You’re tired and yes you’re annoyed (it’s OK to be annoyed) but when you tentatively venture into your child’s room, most likely you’ll find he/she is sleeping, well, like a baby.
10 Cold & Flu Kid-soothing Secrets
The average kid suffers through eight colds a year, which means that all parents become well versed in nursing a miserable, sniffling child back to health. That’s why we turned to the experts — real moms and dads like you — for their go-to moves for easing symptoms, entertaining bored kids and staying sane during sick season. The next time your little one is under the weather, try using a few of these tips and tricks:
- Find restful activities.
“To keep my 21-month-old son entertained when he’s under the weather, I focus on activities he can do while seated, like puzzles, coloring books and stickers. We also work on little skills, like “pull off your sock’ or “try to get your slipper on by yourself.’ It sounds small, but it keeps him resting while he’s occupied. I also let him watch TV and play with my iPhone or iPad: Since he’s usually not allowed to do those things, it’s a big treat.” — Brooke Lea Foster, parenting blogger (MommyMoi) - Serve up cold-fighting foods.
“I feed my kids meals that help boost their immune system and speed the healing process: foods rich in vitamin A (carrots and broccoli), vitamin C (pineapple, strawberries and OJ) and zinc (whole-grain cereal, lean meat and beans). Getting enough fluids is also crucial, so I encourage them to drink water and sip soup. My mom makes the best chicken soup, and she always drops off a batch when someone is sidelined with a cold.” — Elisa Zied, registered dietician with a master’s degree, author of Nutrition at Your Fingertips and Feed Your Family Right!, founder/president of Zied Health Communications - Scrub right way.
“To prevent the spread of germs throughout the house and to yourself, instruct your kids to wash their hands regularly. Studies show that kids typically only run the water for five seconds and leave with their hands dripping wet, which isn’t effective. Teach them to sing ‘Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star’ or say their ABCs as the scrub up, and dry their hands thoroughly on a clean towel afterwards.
Also make sure that you do the same — only 30 percent of adults hit the sink after coughing or sneezing! If you sometimes forget, consider leaving a bottle of alcohol-based hand sanitizer right outside of your sick child’s room.” — Harley Rotbart, M.D., professor and vice chairman of pediatrics at the University of Colorado School of Medicine and Children’s Hospital of Denver, author of Germ Proof Your Kids, father of three - Ask for a hand.
“To keep my own sanity when the kids are sick, I call in the reserves! My mother-in-law lives locally, so she’s a big help and a fun person to visit when the kids can’t play with their buddies. I might plan an outing for the evening — maybe a movie with girlfriends — so I have something to look forward to after being cooped up in the house all day.I also ask my husband for assistance. We recently had to give our 2-year-old daughter eye drops, and it was a team effort. My husband held and distracted her, while I applied the medicine and repeated the word “gentle” to calm her down. When we finished, we clapped, sang and danced, and all was forgotten in no time.” — Elizabeth Detmer, mom of two - Provide comfort.
“During a cold, the main goal is to keep your child comfortable — dressing in light layers and turning down the thermostat if necessary. Sometimes I’ll run a cooling bath to provide some relief and, if necessary, offer ibuprofen or acetaminophen for a fever.” — Dr. Hannah Chow, pediatrician and assistant professor of pediatrics at the Stritch School of Medicine at Loyola University Chicago - Break out special treats.
When my two kids are sick, I bring out a goody bag that I keep for rainy days or when they’ve been especially good. It’s usually just filled with stuff that I’ve picked up at sales, like activity packs, puzzles, small toys and other seasonal crafts.
In the evenings, I’ll warm up apple cider, ginger tea with honey and lemon or vanilla soymilk, which is soothing. I try to cater to my kids when they’re under the weather, because being sick is no fun.” — Joanne Kim, mom of two - Fluff an extra pillow.
“My 4-year-old has an abundance of energy, so I know he’s sick when he actually slows down. To clear up his stuffy nose, I use a saline spray and prop an extra pillow under his head to help him breathe easier while he’s sleeping.
I’ve also taught him how to sneeze into the crook of his elbow so that he doesn’t spread germs. It’s hard to take care of a little one when you’re sick too!” — Holly Tillotson, mom of one - Freeze popsicles.
“Cold popsicles help soothe sore throats. Try making your own from drinks that also provide a dose of vitamin C, like orange juice and fresh berry smoothies.” — Sarah Krieger, registered dietitian who holds a master’s in public health, clinical pediatric dietitian in the community education department of All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg, Fla., and spokeswoman for the American Dietetic Association - Play it on repeat.
“Although it can drive me crazy, I let my kids watch their favorite movies as many times as they want. My 3-year-old daughter just had a stomach bug and watched Tangled three times over two days. I knew she was feeling better when she got up to sing and even dance a little during the song “Mother Knows Best.” — Betsy Stephens, blogger (Working for Cookies) - Bend the rules.
“My biggest advice for our own sanity as moms is to drop the demands. Let me explain: As parents, we ask our kids to do things, from the simple ‘drink your milk’ to the complex ‘clean your room.’ Then we have to follow through and make sure they listen to us. When kids are sick, they’re less able to do as we say, because they’re cranky and miserable. Any little thing can trigger a meltdown. So it makes sense to table regular requests (pick up your toys), but follow through on anything that you do ask (put the tissue in the trash can). This approach will make it easier for children to transition back to meeting your behavior expectations when they’re feeling better.” — Carin Daddino, former special education teacher and mom of two
