Cough and Cold (Children)

If a child’s immunity system is rather weaker, infectious diseases find a suitable medium in him. On an average a normal child has about 4 to 5 coughs and colds round the year. There is a fallacy that the coughs and colds are owing to the consumption of cold foods. They are in fact because of the viral infection of the mucous membranes of the nose, sinuses, ears and throat. It spreads usually if a child is in contact with a person having cough and cold.

When a child has a running nose and sneezing, it proves the onset of cough and cold. The sign most commonly manifested for cold is low grade fever that some parents put aside as the child coming out from a warm and cosy room or just nothing. Infants up to three months might not have fever. Children beyond 3 year may not have fever but they may have drooping nose and sneezing and

coughing owing to the nasal discharge trickling down the back of the throat. Besides, an infant might find it quite difficult to take feed. In that case, saline nasal drops might provide relief. But the child should not be kept in very warm environs. Even hot steaming can be harmful and result in dehydration. The environs should be cosy that once the child recovers from the problem, it doesn’t relapse owing to getting used to the heated atmosphere.

If cold doesn’t subside within 10 days and there is also greenish nasal discharge, it means that there is some bacterial infection in the throat, sinuses, nose or the ear (if the discharge is yellowish-green). Continuous sneezing is not a good sign as it can mean that the child has been suffering from the attack of pneumonia along with the cough episode. Sneezing owing to some allergy like, dust, smoke or any chemical odour or fumes, subsides. If a child is found to be allergic to certain environs, he must not be exposed to them unless inevitable. If it is inevitable, then he must be given some anti-allergic medicines. Unless a child starts speaking fluently, he cannot tell that he has a soar throat. Amongst children, 8 out of 16 soar throats are caused by the virus while the rest are caused by the bacteria that usually result in inflammation of the tonsils. This condition is known as “tonsillitis” or “pharyngitis” and is very itchy and makes the child very restless and cross. He desists from eating or accepting the feed. Soar throat, an awfully irritating problem occurs owing to acute cold and cough.

Cold that gives rise to tonsillitis also results in running nose and swollen lymph nodes in the neck. The tonsils become inflamed, large and reddish in colour occasionally with accumulation of pus as well. This is very painful in smaller children. There is often high fever and even vomiting. Unless immediately attended to in a hospital, the complications can increase resulting into nephritis or rheumatic fever. In such a case, a course of antibiotics is advised. What is usually better is that a throat swab culture should be done before prescribing the antibiotics. Infants must be kept off from antibiotics unless it is of paramount importance and there is a condition for life saving.

The best thing for a child suffering from cold and coughs is to make him stay indoors making provisions for various toys. Some parents believe that it is quite useful to make the surroundings hot if a child suffers from fever and cold. In fever, it is no use loading the child with many woolens as it might be harmful. What is useful is that he must be placed in cooler environs. Besides, the child must be allowed to eat and drink whatever he likes. One particular problem in very small children of 3 to 6 months can be the ear ache caused after the infection from cold in the middle ear. A warm hot water bottle can provide relief to the child if kept against the ear.

In order to avoid the ear ache either caused by the infection in the middle ear (otitis media) or in the external ear (otitis external), after every bath, the external ear must be dried with the help of a soft cloth or cotton. A still better thing would be to stuff some cotton in the ears when a child is being taken for bath. A simple thing that can save many problems. A child must be discouraged from scratching his ear or nose as any harmful ingredient can disturb the flow of fluid from the middle ear to the throat. If there is continuous discharge from the ear, that can be serious and result in the perforation of the ear drum, loss of hearing or mastoiditis. Besides, a lot of this disease can be controlled by regulating the diet suiting the seasonal calculations.