A healthy baby is a tremendous happiness, and the mothers who are faced with the frequent illnesses of their child are best aware of this. A full first-aid kit is always at the ready, the mother understands in diagnoses and methods of treatment no worse than the district pediatrician, and life turns into a struggle with drafts and eternal surveillance: is the jacket too light, the cap slipped and the neck is good at closing.
Is there a definition of a frequently ill child?
To determine whether your baby is in the category of "frequently ill," you can consult the opinion of domestic pediatricians:
- Children up to a year - from 4 diseases per year or more;
- Children from 1 to 3 years old - from 6 diseases a year or more;
- Children preschoolers - from 5 diseases a year or more.
An indicator of weakened immunity is also the duration of the disease, for example, ARD and ARVI, not passing for 2 weeks, indicates that the child is often ill. But it is necessary to make allowances for the fact that children attending kindergartens and younger schoolchildren will have a higher incidence of diseases than those who are in home education.
The reasons
Undermine the health and immunity of the child can many factors. The list of reasons why the baby is sick more often and heavier than other children is great:
- Prematurity
- Intrauterine infection.
- Early termination of breastfeeding.
- Contacts with a lot of peers and adults.
- Transferred surgery.
- Transferred serious diseases that undermine the immune system: pneumonia, tonsillitis, the effects of severe influenza.
- The presence of parasites.
- Available chronic diseases - often it is chronic tonsillitis, adenoids and sinusitis.
- Failure to follow the correct daily regimen is the absence of a full and timely rest, unhealthy diet and avitaminosis resulting from this.
- Long-term drug therapy with the use of certain drugs: immunosuppressants, antibiotics, steroid hormones.
How to help the baby?
Of course, the child’s health will also depend on the mother’s behavior during planning and pregnancy. Preliminary tests and treatment of existing infections, proper and complete nutrition, good health of the pregnant woman and successful birth have a positive effect on the health of the baby. The period of infancy is also important - for example, not all mothers know that not only mother’s smoking is dangerous for a baby, but also volatile substances from cigarettes brought on the hair and clothes of other family members. Approved by WHO experts, a convenient and effective measure is long-term breastfeeding. But these measures are ideal as a preventive measure, so what can advise those mothers whose child, alas, fell into the category of frequently ill?
- Proper nutrition. It is necessary to accustom the child to natural food, since it is the right diet that helps to get the necessary vitamins and trace elements. Food culture is also important - various snacks and snacks are not only harmful for their composition, but also drown out the natural feeling of hunger, forcing the child to give up healthy and healthy food.
- The organization of home space. Often mothers mistaken for sterility as a right approach to hygiene, which is in competition with the conditions of the operating room. But to maintain the health of the baby requires only the simplest things: wet cleaning, airing, eliminating dust collectors.
- Hygiene. To accustom the baby to the habit of washing hands, coming from the street, after going to the toilet and before eating is an important rule. The earlier the hygienic rules are grafted onto the child, the greater the likelihood that he will abide by them without being under parental control — in kindergarten and at school.
- Fresh air and active lifestyle. Often sick children become hostages of their immunity. Frightened parents prefer to sit out at home and in bad weather, and epidemics of childhood illnesses, and simply the blues of their child. But the result is a vicious circle, which is harder to break. Frequent, active walks in the fresh air will not bring harm, helping, on the contrary, to strengthen the immune system.
- Hardening The hardening that a healthy child gets in a natural way — small drafts, walking barefoot, ice-cream and drinks directly from the refrigerator — becomes a taboo for an often sick child. Therefore, the hardening that he needs is an impossible condition. Nevertheless, it is necessary to teach a child to the natural conditions - a sea holiday, summer spent in the country, morning washings with cool water do not look so scary, and will help to begin work on hardening the child.
Text: Vera Guler
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