Sick Again - Diagnosis

We went in to see Dr. Anderson yesterday because Jonathan has had a recurrence of the coughing and throwing up routine, and this morning started a fever.
He says it is most likely a virus that is causing postnasal drip, which is irritating his throat to make his cough, which is causing his stomach to upset. In addition, with the nasal cavities irritated, he has two flaming ear infections, which probably started this morning with the fever.

He said his lungs sound fine, but to keep a lookout for more serious breathing symptoms, as it has a chance of being pneumonia. He did think it unlikely because Jonathan was playing around the office, opening drawers and generally being himself. He said a kid with pneumonia would not feel like doing anything.

He gave us a prescription for antibiotics for us to fill if we felt we needed it. Dr.Anderson is also of the opinion that the "old ladies" are wrong - he said Jonathan can play outside and in his kiddie pool as long as he was happy and not shivering or turning blue.

Last evening, he was acting much happier, playing with our friends who came over for dinner.
Posted by Heather Daley on April 5, 2005, 8:07 am | Read 1653 times
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Comments
No that I know enough to give advice, but I'll just mention the warnings I've heard from my ASL teacher. It's great that you're teaching him sign, but you don't want him to be dependent on it. In other words, ear infections are still a leading cause of deafness for children. I know we don't like to overmedicate, but do keep that in mind! Also, are you having trouble with spam, or is it just a precaution? (Refering to the code you must copy to post a comment)
Posted by Janet on April 5, 2005, 9:19 am
We had one spam sort of strange comment, and a number of other users of blogging systems complain about spam, and the hours it took them to remove all of the spam comments on their system.
There is probably a script to remove them, so it wouldn't really take that long, but in any case, it seems easier to add this code thingy, rather than try to remove them later.
The image is supposed to have an image in the background, to make it harder for computers to recognize the code, but I figured I would try it like this, and see how it goes.
Posted by jondaley on April 5, 2005, 9:51 am
Regarding ear infections and deafness, it really depends on who you read and believe. We have a book written by a pediatrician who says it's not ear infections per se that cause deafness, but the treatments for ear infections that pediatricians do to kids that cause deafness! He writes that some temporary hearing loss that occurs goes away and that permanant damage is extremely rare.

Our pediatrician did say that he wants to check his ears again in a few weeks to make sure that they're clear - temporary hearing loss at this age does affect language learning and skills.

So I'm not totally against medicine when they really help. That's why I did have him make the prescription - we have it in case we need it, without having to go in and see him again.
Posted by joyful on April 5, 2005, 11:18 am
One important point is that the doctor said the ear infections are probably viral, another reason not to start the antibiotic yet, keeping the prescription handy in case it turns out to be a secondary, bacterial infection.
Posted by SursumCorda on April 5, 2005, 11:53 am
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