Editor’s note: Dr. Jennifer Shu, CNNHealth’s Living Well consultant doctor, is a practicing pediatrician and mom of two.
(CNN) — If we go to a doctor’s bureau or sanatorium any time soon, we might confront an unusually prolonged wait.. This year’s influenza deteriorate started earlier, and health officials contend it is some-more widespread and some-more severe than usual.
To assistance forestall your child from carrying to find caring for influenza or a identical illness, here are some tips to keep in mind:
1. Make certain your child gets this season’s influenza vaccine.
Even yet influenza deteriorate started early this year, a finish isn’t near, so it’s not too late for your child to get a shot or nasal mist vaccine. While a vaccine can’t totally forestall children from removing a influenza (it’s about 62% effective, according to a latest numbers from a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), it can digest a illness if they do get ill and keep symptoms milder.
2. Practice good cough practice and amicable distancing.
Flu germs can widespread adult to 6 feet by coughs and sneezes, so learn children to cover their mouth and nose with a hankie and to chuck divided a tissue. Make certain to purify their hands afterward!
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Also, keep your kids home if they are ill (and daunt ill kids from visiting). This might meant canceling play dates or postponing birthday parties. If possible, ask teachers to keep desks in a classroom distant rather than pulling them together to form incomparable tables.
Keep ill children in their possess room, or if a rest of a family is already sick, “quarantine” children though symptoms to keep them divided from a influenza virus.
If influenza is attack your village hard, cruise avoiding vast crowds (such as going to cinema or out to dinner) until things settle down.
Read more: Flu leads to Texas teen’s death
3. Keep hands and common objects/surfaces clean.
This is a many critical time of year for hand-washing. Teach kids to their rinse hands for during slightest 20 seconds — or about a time it takes to sing a “Happy Birthday” song.
Flu viruses can live adult to 8 hours on surfaces, so try to mislay germs from toys, handles, counters, tables, phones, TV remotes, etc. regulating prohibited fatty H2O or a cleaning product that removes influenza. The EPA has a list of disinfectants that are effective opposite a flu.
4. Stay healthy.
The common good health practices still request during cold and influenza season; good nutrition, assuage practice and adequate rest assistance optimize a defence system.
Offer your child a well-balanced diet including fruits, vegetables, divert and water. Make certain your child gets copiousness of sleep (at slightest 10 hours for school-age children and 12 hours for toddlers). Encourage during slightest one hour of earthy activity on many days of a week.
5. For kids with flu, provide a symptoms and keep them comfortable.
Home remedies should embody rest and copiousness of fluids. Offer your child sugar for a cough (for kids over 1 year, it’s a good cough suppressant though intensity side effects), medicated chest rubs for cough/congestion, a humidifier/vaporizer, and salty nose drops.
Fever reducers such as acetaminophen (Tylenol) or ibuprofen (Advil and Motrin) can help, though remember to equivocate aspirin, that can means a critical illness called Reye Syndrome in children with a viral illness.
An antiviral medicine like Tamiflu or Relenza might be prescribed for certain patients within a initial 48 hours of a illness; a remedy can digest a symptoms and astringency of a influenza as good as a child’s contagiousness.
Most healthy kids over 2 years aged get improved within a few days though any antiviral medicine. Just be certain to watch out for worsening heat or cough, as this might be a pointer of a snarl such as pneumonia.
Map: State-by-state influenza numbers
If we have a flu, how are we treating it? Send photos of your influenza presence kits.
Source: Health Medicine Network