Children's Health

There has been concern expressed about the safety and usefulness of treating coughs and colds in children. Most cough and cold treatments are no longer regarded as being suitable for children under the age of six; but that is little comfort when your child is unwell and you want to ease their symptoms so they and the family can recover.

The finger and toenails of babies grow quickly, or appear to grow past the end of their fingers and toes faster than those of older children and adults. As infants have little control over their muscles, self-inflicted scratches are common from their own nails as a result of their arms and legs waving about. It is important to prevent scratches by keeping their nails short.

Rheumatic fever is an infection that mainly affects the young - it usually starts with a sore throat, then after a few weeks develops into painful or swollen joints such as knees and elbows, high temperatures and occasionally a skin rash or stomach pain may occur as well.

School sores is the common name for impetigo, which is a highly contagious skin infection. The bacteria that cause impetigo are normally on the surface of the skin and in the air around us. When skin gets broken by scratches, insect bites or other injuries bacteria can enter the body, multiply and form sores around the injured area.

Whooping cough is the common term for pertussis, an extremely infectious bacterial infection. When infected with pertussis the sufferer has violent attacks of coughing, with a characteristic ‘whoop’ caused when you try to take a breath in during a coughing attack.