February 3, 2012

My sick baby (advice wanted)

What a day yesterday ended up being!

Andrew went down for a nap like it was any old day, woke up, and felt a little hot to me. Not enough to stick the thermometer in the forbidden land, but enough to where I touched his forehead, cheeks and neck every 15 minutes or so, probably irritating him even further. His nose was a little runny, but besides the fever, that was the only symptom he had.

About an hour later, it was time for the thermometer. His whole little body was on fire. 103.2 - color me panicked. Called Tele-nurse, they had me take him to urgent care, and the chaos and incompetence ensues. It was just pretty obvious that I wasn't at a Pediatric clinic.. that was for sure. I won't even get into everything that infuriated me there, because after very minimal sleep I don't have the patience to type all that out, and it just not being the point of this post, I'll spare those fun details.

Basically, we left there with the genius advice of - we have no idea what's wrong with him. His throat is a little red, and it's clear by the almost 104 degree temperature that his body is fighting something, but we don't know what. Here's a script for an antibiotic. That should kill whatever it is.

Seriously?

It was late when we left, and his temperature had fallen a little bit, so I planned to either get it filled this morning, or make an appt with his Ped to double check everything.

Silly me for thinking we were in the clear. We spent almost all night up and my poor baby was miserable. His temp got back up to 103.8 around 2:30am. We tried to drink water, made a makeshift bed in the living room, and watched Cars.

He finally did go back to bed and woke up this morning in a pool of sweat. His fever finally broke! He ate his breakfast and is now playing with trucks and stacking his blocks. Yay!

Now, here's my dilemma for any nurse types out there reading this -
Give the antibiotic or just let it go? I tried to get him seen by the Pediatric office today to double check, but nothing is available. I hate to give him the meds if this is just a little viral cold. But I also don't want to see him go back to where he was last night, or worse, develop another ear infection.

Thoughts?

2 comments:

LizTorres said...

I would call and ask someone at the pediatric clinic. They're honestly the one people that could really tell you anything substantial. Hope your little man keeps feeling better.

Jenn said...

I would call the Peds clinic too! I am so not a fan of "trying out" random antibiotics (especially when they're so leeeetle!) because eventually they can build up tolerances to them, etc, so checking with doc would be the way to go.
Sam got sick recently too (first time- I was a hot mess), and his doc said that they were seeing a big rise in strep, bronchitis, and ear infections. Luckily (I think), he had an ear infection. Hopefully the doc can see him soon and make sure he gets the right meds to clear him up!! Good luck!!!