Hysterical baby after 8 week vaccinations

[Helpplease2828]

DS has his 8 week vaccinations this afternoon and was fine after. However for the past two hours he has screamed at the top of his lungs, not crying but hysterical screaming. It sounds like he's losing his voice from how high pitched the scream is. He's thrown up the calpol. He's inconsolable. I'm on the verge of ringing 111, but is this normal? I didn't expect it to be this brutal.

No, not normal. Ringing 111 won’t hurt.

Does he have a fever?

Try more calpol but I'd ring for advice anyway to settle your mind, dd was very sleepy, cried abit and was off milk a little but wasnt screaming, we kept her dosed up for 2 days then she was fine x

Not normal.
Check his temperature.
Undress him and examine him from head to toe in case there is a hair wrapped round somewhere, or another cause of pain.
What does the injection site look like?

I'd call 111. This sounds like more than typical post-jabs grizzling.

Keep checking his temp it's not too high yet. 36.5. It's just the screaming bless him. Tears streaming down his face for hours. I can't take it anymore! So god knows how he feels

Not normal!!! Call 111 for advice. Will he take a feed?

This happened to a friend, it wasn't anything to do with the jabs, it was a coincidental torsion of the testis. Don't assume it is the jabs. Check him over carefully and ring 111.

Is he sore on the side where the tetanus jab was? DS1 had a terrible night after his first jabs - he ended up with a raised red sore patch over the site of the tetanus jab, but it took a few hours to actually see the swelling.

I spent the whole night holding him on his other side, with a cool damp flannel against the sore leg.

Change the environment to distract him. Nice cool bath? Out in the buggy?

I would get him checked out, though.

My baby was the same 2 weeks ago.
We tried a flannel on her legs but it was too sore for her. So we put her in the bath and she was absolutely fine afterward!
Obviously I don't know if your LO will be the same but just my experience 😊

If he is screaming like that he must be in pain.

I would get him checked, it sounds like an extreme reaction. Some grizzles and being unsettled is normal but hours of hysterical screaming doesn't seem right to me

Could be the Calpol, mine had reactions to it. try neurofen or a kids paracetomol that doesn't contain sorbitol

Definitely call 111. We had a similar experience with DT2 when he had chicken pox, just screaming all night. He’s older but non verbal - after a while I realised it was definitely not normal and called 111, they didn’t call back until 3am and he’d just fallen asleep after screaming for 8 straight hours. They couldn’t assess him because he was asleep!

Waited til the next morning, saw GP who was very dismissive and ended up at the hospital that night - he had a serious skin infection.

Trust your instincts. If 111 make you wait too long and things aren’t getting better just go to A&E, I wish I had!

I don’t think you can use ibuprofen on an eight week old.

My DS had a very similar reaction after his Men B vaccine both times. Ended up with a temperature of over 40. I called 111 both times and they arranged for him to see an out of hours GP as a matter of urgency. Ultimately they just told us to give calpol and keep him in just a nappy, but it was reassuring to see a dr. Make sure you keep an eye on their temperature through the evening and the night as my DS’s suddenly spiked around 12 hours after his jabs. You’ll notice if they get a bad temp though, as I was sweating from holding DH. Good luck for the rest of the night and don’t be afraid to call 111 - that’s what they’re there for!

Normal!

My DD screamed and screamed that night but was ok the next day.

My usually calm baby was also hysterical after the 8 week inoculations. Apparently it is a reasonably common reaction to the live Rotavirus vaccine. He screamed for 3 hours then did a huge poop and was instantly fine again. I almost took him to A & E because the advice leaflet said ‘grumpy and tired’ so I didn’t expect such a reaction but when I mentioned it to the nurse at his next appointment she said it was normal. Still worth ringing for advice to be on the safe side.

Well done on getting your baby vaccinated - any of the diseases he’s now protected against would be worse than this.
But yes, I’d take him to a GP just to be sure. And I’d try and get some calpol into him if poss

I wondered if it might have been the rotavirus vaccine actually. It’s a live one so basically gives them a mild dose (which means you have to be super hygenic when dealing with vomit or poo as it can transmit rotavirus to anyone who hasn’t had it - that’s why I declined it for DC2) so he might have horrendous tummy ache. I’d still seek medical advice because he’s so little and obviously in awful pain.

And check you aren't pushing on the injection site as that caused my youngest to howl - seems unlikely though that would cause screaming for so.long. sounds like real pain so definitely get him checked.

When mine were babies medical advice was any continuous crying for more than an hour at such a young age needs checking.

I remember this with my DD, both of us were in tears! She only cried for a couple of hours though, maybe 3 at the most. Skin to skin helped. Made my DH book time off for the other sets of jabs so we could tag team if she reacted as badly but she was absolutely fine with them!

Def 111 if you are concerned though

We had this, it was awful. He could not be comforted. I think it was his tummy - we ended up taking him back to the doctor who said his tummy was making some very odd noises and literally as we were walking out he did a mess I've green poo. Then he was fine!