You Decide: Anti-Nausea Medicine #1 – Phenergan

Have you ever gone to the doctor to get some nausea medicine or given medication to your child to help with vomiting?  If you are my age, you may not have given it to your children, but you almost certainly got it when you were a child.  Despite all the current warnings against the use of most nausea medications, I still get parents coming into the ER asking for a prescription for Phenergan.  Worse, I even see some kids whose doctors Read more

Understanding Vomiting

It is not uncommon for parents to come into the ER after their child has had one or two episodes of vomiting requesting IV Fluids.  This is simply not a good idea.  Most children with a few episodes of vomiting do not need an IV.  Especially since the process of getting an IV can be quite torturous for kids. Read more

As a Parent… Constipation

For years I have been helping parents deal with constipation in their newborns and infants. Over the last 6 months, I have had the chance to deal with this problem myself… As a Parent. While constipation is generally not an emergent problem, it can be problematic for both parents and their new babies.  Especially when it makes spitting up worse, interferes with naps, or leads to lots of fussiness. Read more

Treatment Guidelines: Cough

Cough in children is generally the result of nasal congestion.  The most common cause of nasal congestion in kids is a cold, which is caused by a virus.  In most cases, to successfully treat cough, you need to treat the nasal congestion.

If the cough still persists, I suggest a teaspoon of honey for kids over 12 months of age. This can be repeated after 30 minutes if the cough persists. Read more

Myths & Facts: Vomiting

Like fever, there is considerable confusion over vomiting and I will attempt to resolve many of the myths with this post. First, let me remind you that the human race has survived for tens of thousands of years. Part of the credit for this amazing accomplishment is certainly due to the body’s ability to rid itself of those things that are harmful. Vomiting is one of the ways the body accomplishes this and in almost all cases it is GOOD. In otherwise healthy children, there is little reason to believe that vomiting is dangerous. Read more

Dropping the Last Feed

In Babywise, it states that most infants will be sleeping through the night by 12 weeks of age. You can imagine our concern when our son was still waking up at 4:30a as he was approaching 6 months. The problem and solution revolve around properly understanding sleep in babies. Read more

On Becoming Healthy…

It is the start of a new year and with each new year Americans generally usher in some sort of new diet. Now, in medical school and residency training we get shockingly little education on what it actually means to diet, or more specifically what it means to be healthy. As such, in my spare time (of which I obviously have plenty given this little internet project) I have tried to educate myself on healthy living. Read more

What is a virus?

In the world of pediatrics, pretty much any intelligent conversation about infection must begin with an understanding of this question: What is a virus?  Most pediatric infections are caused by viruses like the common cold. Viruses are completely resistant to antibiotics.  Thus Smart Parents should conclude that there is no reason to request (or accept) an antibiotic for your child if they are diagnosed with a viral infection of any kind.  While most viruses will make your child feel bad, they are generally harmless and will resolve on their own in 5-7 days. Read more

The Return of the 45-Minute Intruder

Shortly after my last post regarding our victory over this very disruptive monster, we had a little setback in our overall war on short naps.  That’s right, the 45-Minute Intruder resurfaced.  At first we just pretended to ignore it hoping that it might leave us alone and move on to some other family.  No such luck! Read more

On Becoming Babywise: The 45-minute intruder

If you are a Babywise parent you are probably aware of this concept.  If not, I am sure you have dealt with the intruder in one form or another.  This post is dedicated to what we have learned about the inturder and the ways we have come up with to best deal with it.  A word of warning though, the intruder can be very nasty and difficult to break.  Babywise will have you believe that the intruder is rare and will likely go away in a week or two.  From my experience and research this is not always the case. Read more

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