To ask how often you give your baby paracetamol?

[Bumpandkind]

I've got a teething 7 month old and usually give chamomilla granules. However I give calpol when it seems worse but this feels like a slippery slope as it works so well! A friend of mine is constantly 'calpoling' her baby with no ill effects and another would only consider giving it if hers had a fever.

I'm curious about what other MNs do.

[mousmous]

if you are worried about the additives you could just give the dc suppositories. they only contain the stuff that holds them together + paracetamol or ibuprofen.

[PollyIndia]

Someone (with zero medical knowledge!) told me that if you give it too regularly then it becomes less effective and that has stuck. I only give it if he has a temp or is really in pain and can't be soothed. Maybe 5 times total until now (15 months). His teeth have rarely kept him up at night though. But I have no idea if that is correct. I agree though, that if they are in lots of pain, why make them suffer? However I also think that being able to cope with a bit of discomfort is no bad thing.

[PleaseJustLeaveYourBrotherAlon]

Only for fevers in the past and I do the paracetamol/ibuprofen at the same time thing too. Been advised due to dd having had febrile seizures. I never really knew when to give it for teething or when they were just beign grizzly etc so left it.

I'd give it to them now (toddler age) if they made it clear they felt rubbish though

[ReticulatingSplines]

5mo DD has had calpol once post-vaccinations, but she's been otherwise well. No teeth yet.

DS gets calpol if he's ill. And ibuprofen if need be. His temperature can get pretty high when he's unwell so I have no qualms about dosing him. He was never bothered by teething.

[Onsera3]

Seldom give it (or ibuprofen which he seems to prefer). I'd heard about the link with asthma and plus the only paracetamol I can find for children here is full of stuff I'd avoid giving DS- sugar, sweeteners, colours/E numbers. I think we almost got through a bottle in his first year. Now I'm more experienced I'd prob use less with next child. Haven't used for months.

He LOVES homeopathic granules etc. I use these and wet wash cloth and homeopathic gel for teeth and he seems happy with that.

I don't give for fever unless he's miserable as I understand the fever is serving a purpose and his has never been too high.

Basically, I only give it if he is miserable, I know he's in pain and he isn't happy with other alternatives.

[ShadowFall]

I only give DS's calpol if they seem to be in pain or if we need to bring a fever down.

Although, at least as far as DS1 is concerned, ibuprofen works better at reducing his temperature.

I prefer not to use it if possible because I worry about accidental overdoses (particularly as the dosing advice on the bottle goes by age rather than weight) or side-effects.

[PennyJennyPie]

DS is 6.5 months. We have a bottle of Calpol but I haven't opened it. To be fair, no teeth and no sickness either.

[PennyJennyPie]

DS is 6.5 months. We have a bottle of Calpol but I haven't opened it. To be fair, no teeth and no sickness either.

[PennyJennyPie]

DS is 6.5 months. We have a bottle of Calpol but I haven't opened it. To be fair, no teeth and no sickness either.

[Oriunda]

DS loves the chamomile granules so he will have one of those during the day. If he has been particularly miserable I will give him a dose of Nurofen (better for teething) at bedtime but not during day.

Distraction/cuddles/granules are fine for daytime but at night I want him to have a good sleep.

As for accidental overdosing, well if DS is ill (eg when he had croup and we regularly needed to dose him) any meds get noted on my Total Baby app so it's really impossible for us to give him too much.

[Slebmum]

Whenever they need it, and piggyback it with Nurofen if needed too. If I had a pain I wouldn't chew on some sugar crystals!

[Lambsie]

I give it whenever my son appears to be in a lot of pain. A long standing ear infection has meant calpol/ibuprofen being given up to 7 times a day (only getting the max safe dose of each) for the last 6 weeks. GP is fine with this. He didn't have very much as a baby but he never needed it. I've never given it for fever alone though.

[curlew]

Just remember that the reason they tend to love the homeopathic powders and that they appear to work is that they are made of sugar! A smartie would work just as well and be much cheaper.......

[ChrisTheSheep]

Oriunda, my DS has croup a lot too, and the doctor advised me to give him calpol for that rather than ibuprofen: apparently ibuprofen can exacerbate the wheeziness. I didn't realise that before she told me, but the hospital corroborated too.

[ChrisTheSheep]

Curlew, I have to say I agree. Do you know Tim Minchin's medicine poem?

[curlew]

I never gave mine either for croup-what is it supposed to help with?

[AmazingBouncingFerret]

Not as much as I used to but that's purely because neither of them are teething anymore and they don't seem to have been ill for a long time.

At one point though I was going to rename them the Calpol Junkies.

[ChrisTheSheep]

DS often had a temperature when he had croup: the calpol doesn't admittedly do anything for the narrowing of the airways, but it did help take his temperature down. When he was really bad (and a lot smaller) the only things which really helped were steroids, but now he's on the verge of growing out of it, and calming, cool air etc tend to settle the wheezing while calpol sorts out any temperature/pain.

[NomenOmen]

My DD pretty much refuses to take Calpol or Nurofen, so in her life (she's 5) she's probably taken it about 4 times (and then only a half dose, as she tends to spit it out . Helpful.).

However, a little girl I used to babysit for when I was a student used to ask me to give her Calpol when she was feeling sad. I think she associated it with 'feeling better,' so if she was missing her mummy or just in a grumpy mood, she'd ask "Me Calpol?"

[curlew]

Ah, I see. I don't see the point of bringing down a temperature in most circumstances, so that's why I didn't use it.

[Oriunda]

Just to clarify, I said meds when he had croup, not nurofen. Apologies for not specifying. I give nurofen for teething as is more effective. When he has a temperature not related to teething then I give calpol. Of course I wouldn't do anything to make his wheezing worse, and took advice from the doctor. Curlew, he was burning up when he had croup, so again on the doctor's advice, I gave calpol.

[ShadowFall]

curlew - your point about babies loving homeopathic powders because they are made of sugar has just reminded me about something:

DS1 spent his first 3.5 weeks in the hospital neo-natal ward because he was premature, and he had to have his blood taken for testing a couple of times.

Before they took the blood, they gave him a small amount of a sugar solution from a syringe (they let me taste some of it and it wasn't anywhere near as sweet as a smartie) - the doctor said that they were giving DS1 the sugar solution because it worked as a painkiller for tiny babies.

No idea if this pain reducing effect of sugar works for bigger babies though.

[JRmumma]

DS is 5 months and im half way through my second bottle of Calpol already. He has had 2 bouts of bronchilitis and pneumonia for 2 weeks with a v high temp so we needed to use it quite a bit. He also had regular doses in hospital so has had more on top of the Calpol we have given.

I don't like to give it and haven't done so outside of those times of illness when he was obviously in discomfort or pain, but he has had quite alot i think for his age.

I don't use Nurofen at all, as regular use of ibuprofen to treat hangovers when i was a student damaged my insides so I'm not keen on using it at all while he is so young. I know that is a bit irrational as id never use it on him to the extent that I did back then but it does make me wary of it as he already has quite a sensitive tummy.

[ikeaismylocal]

On average probably once every 2 weeks, sometimes I give it for teething, a couple of times ds has had a fever lasting 2-3 days, then I have given it throughout the day.

There was a recent Swedish study that showed paracetamol use in pregnancy and young children can damage their brain. It was a mouse study so not necessarily correct.