Category: Infections
Trumenba (Meningitis B) Vaccine Now Available
Bacterial meningitis (infection around the spinal cord and brain) or sepsis (infection in the blood stream) is an extremely serious illness. The bacterium Neisseria meningitis (meningococous) is a cause of meningitis or septic shock in adolescents and young adults.
Even with appropriate antibiotics and intensive care, between 10 and 15 percent of people who develop meningococcal disease die, and another 10 to 20 percent suffer complications, such as brain damage or limb loss. Read More
Willows Wants You to Know About Tick Bites & Lyme Disease
As warm weather approaches (rather early this year!), we know that kids will be playing outside. Here in Westport and in the surrounding towns, wooded areas are home to deer … and along with the deer come deer ticks. So Willows Pediatrics thought it would be a good idea to review our recommendations on tick bites and Lyme disease today.
We have an excellent article on tick bites on our blog, and we encourage you to read it thoroughly. In essence, we recommend that parents or caregivers do a daily inspection for ticks. The reason daily checks are important is because we know that a tick must be on the body for 36-48 hours to pass any illness to humans. If a tick is promptly found and removed, Lyme can be prevented.
If you find a tick, remove it using tweezers. (We suggest you purchase a pair of fine-nosed tweezers specifically for this purpose.) Grab the base of the tick against the skin with and steadily pull the tick out. Don’t worry if part of the head, or part of a limb cannot be removed, as the disease-carrying portion of a tick is the abdomen. After removing the tick you can keep the bite area clean with soap and water and apply a topical antibiotic for a few days. Read More
Willows Pediatrics And FDA Do Not Recommend Cough And Cold Medicines For Children Under Two Years Of Age
Back in 2008, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recommended that over-the-counter (OTC) cough and coldmedication should not be used in infants and children under the age of two, and Willows Pediatrics agrees. The FDA found that these products could cause serious and potentially life-threatening side effects in young children including convulsions, rapid heart rates, decreased levels of consciousness and death. This recommendation led to a voluntary recall of these types of products marketed to children under two. Read More
Lice: Keeping Those Creepy Critters at Bay … and Getting Rid of Them Once They’ve Arrived
Nothing gives our favorite Connecticut parents the heebie jeebies like a case of head lice! Head lice (pediculosis capitis), while relatively harmless to children, causes great anxiety and stress to families who find themselves dealing with a lice infestation.
Before we get into the “nit-ty” (pun intended) gritty, there are two things we’d like to remind our Willows Pediatrics patients of: (1) that head lice is not a sign of poor hygiene and (2) head lice do not carry disease. Read More