To think people take their DC to the doctor too often?

[MrsTawdry]

AIBU? So many people I know are always off to the docs with their DC. "Oh he's been coughing and sneezing for the last two days"

Or "Oh she's not eating her dinner and sleeping badly..." that one was about a teething toddler by the way.

I didn't even take my DDs when they had Chicken Pox!

Was that bad of me? I just gave them some over the counter medicine and applied calamine and some other stuff the chemist gave me for the bath.

Should I have taken them? Am I lax?

The DC I'm talking about don't have impaired immunes or asthma or anything...

I have to say I think in general British people take their children to the doctor a lot more often than Irish. I suppose that is not surprising since it is free in the UK, in Ireland you have to pay €60 per consultation. I bet a lot of people wouldn't go as often if they had to pay.
So YANBU but I think it is a natural consequence of a free service that it will be used a lot more often. I'll often leave my kids a day or two to see if they shake whatever bug they have rather than drop €60 on a visit to be told its a virus. Most of the time they do shake it themselves but occasionally they don't and it's awful to know you've left them an extra day before getting treatment.
Think over visiting is better than the alternative of really sick kids not getting medical help because parents don't have the cash that month.

YANBU. For everyone with a horror story there will be 50, 100, 500 kids who has been to the doctors unnecessarily. And probably their parents too! People moan about the NHS being in crisis but it is being abused at this primary level by insisting children (and even worse adults) are seen for minor things that require time and maybe a little nursing to improve. There is no magic cure for a cold. Vomiting and diarrhoea is unpleasant but if it is going around, it is going around. Chicken pox-unbelievable the amount of people I have heard of who has taken their kids in to be diagnosed despite there being multiple cases at nursery/school. The other factor is people's obsession with being clean-let your kids eat dirt and scrabble around outside, let them touch animals, stop sanitising their whole existence and they will be much more able to keep all these inconvenient illnesses at bay!

Yabu and stop bothering about other peoples business. Good for you if you didn't take your child for CP, what's that got to do with the next person.

It's very easy to say people shouldn't go to the doctor for minor things, but you can't have both (a) public health campaigns that tell parents to be constantly vigilant about the health of their child and which make them feel responsible for spotting when a child might be seriously ill; and (b) then expect that a lot of "worried well" aren't going to be down at the surgery or A&E by the minutes.

Pretty much every public child health campaign in the last 30 years has stressed parental vigilance - from SIDS to the meningitis glass test. It is hardly surprising that people are then down at the GP a lot with their kids. That isn't either surprising (or in itself a particularly bad thing).

This has been compounded by services like the new 111 which is often not clinically staffed, and uses call centre workers who follow flow charts - so of course they overcompensate for risk. Anything that could turn out to be meningitis or something similarly serious will get referred up immediately for a GP/A&E visit just in case (anecdotally this is what is contributing to the A&E crisis in my area, at least).

Forty, fifty years ago there was not the same level of public awareness or medical knowledge about serious illnesses and side-effects that could befall your child, nor a culture that it was you, the parent, who would need to catch it in time to make a difference if your child happened to have meningitis/septicaemia/a brain bleed from a head injury/a severe reaction to a childhood disease and so on. Now the culture is very different. People are encouraged to take active responsibility for their health. Of course you then get the phenomenon of the "worried well" - but there isn't an easy answer to it, unfortunately, apart from trying to educate people more about when they should or shouldn't see a healthcare professional.

I would think the majority of people have better things to do than risk their kids health in a germ ridden waiting room or take time off work for a sniffle.

either you know a huge bunch of hyperchondriacs or there are underlying conditions people want to get ahead of that shock horror they don't actually want to tell you.

landrover

landrover - so sorry for your loss, I can't imagine how difficult it must be to know that you sought help that wasn't forthcoming.

I think it depends on your own experience of your health - I was constantly hospitalised as a child and treated for a variety of things, including a range of breathing difficulties and skin problems, so I got quite good at ascertaining whether something needs attention or can be left to sort itself out.

My husband, on the other hand, has probably only been to the GP twice in the last couple of decades and enjoys generally really good health, so he finds it very hard to distinguish between something potentially life threatening and something which could wait a couple of days to see if it gets better or worse. He would probably be more inclined to take a child to the doctor because he has no experience of the difference between, for example, a croupy cough and a proper wheeze, and I think that erring on the side of caution is usually best, especially with children so young that they cannot tell you how they feel.

Give yourself a pat on the back OP

Landrover

YANBU.

We see it all the time on here. Someone will post their child has D&V and lots of posters will say to take them to the GP or A&E. Next a child will have a little bit of a temp, be off their food, or a bit under the weather and the same advice of GP or A&E is spouted. I don't get it. I really don't. My kids are older, they never went to the GP unless they were really ill.

The NHS is on its knees because people use it when it's not necessary. It's the reason why you can't get a GP appointment, it's why you are waiting hours on end in A&E. I really do believe that if people had to pay they would think twice about going.

When I go to the GP, the waiting room is not full of children, it's full of oaps.
I don't know anyone who uses the GP for the hell of it, since it usually involves at least an hour in the waiting room.

We go more than I'd like due to ongoing health problems. Wrt chicken pox, I thought there was no need to bother anyone. After 4 days and very poorly baby I called NHS direct who told me I should wait, all sounded normal. We ended up being admitted through A&E 12 hours later, and I was told I should've sought help earlier. I will never use NHS direct again and will now be more cautious.

Sometimes it's difficult for a parent to judge just how poorly a DC is - bear in mind that most parents aren't medically trained, and small children can get better or worse quite quickly.
I've had my share of appointments for DC where, in retrospect, we didn't need to go and i overreacted. But I've also had times where I put off making an appointment because I thought they weren't that bad or were getting better, and they turned out to be sicker than I thought at first.

Also, the severity of things like colds and chicken pox can vary wildly between different children. My DC had very mild cases of chicken pox, which were only diagnosed by a GP as we happened to be attending a routine immunisation appointment when we noticed that the first spots had appeared. I wouldn't have bothered making an appointment specially for the chicken pox in our case. But I know of other children who had cases of chicken pox severe enough for them to be admitted to hospital.

Landrover

The thing is with children is it can easily be worse than you think, because they can go downhill quickly. I've had times when I've taken them in a little apologetically thinking I might be wasting time, and had them take one look and send me to hospital with them.
On one time, when I asked if I needed to take an overnight bag, he told me to drive straight there, so I said I had to go home first to get the car (we live 5 minutes walk away) and he said he was calling an ambulance then.

I can also say I have taken dd2 and ds to the GP with chickenpox. Dd2 because she was only 6 months old (thanks dd1) and wasn't so much covered with spots, as just one big spot. She was very close to being admitted to hospital-would have been if it wasn't that I still breastfed her, and she was happy to take that as comfort, so was still eating.
With ds it was he developed a cough, and when I looked in his mouth I saw why-he had spots all down his passageway. GP was worried anough about him to do home visits twice a day (three times when he was worst) to keep an eye on him.
Both times I phoned up in advance and they told me to come in after I'd explained.

The NHS is categorically NOT on its knees because people use it when it's not necessary. GP primary care is only given a tiny, tiny proportion of the total NHS budget compared to what it really needs (including what it should really have in order to help prevent later more serious and expensive to treat illness). We have a demographic issue with a large generational bulge of those aged 50+ living longer but often in poor health, and the vast majority of the NHS budget goes on chronic and preventable illness, largely in the over 50 age group who suffer from complex age-related conditions, cancers, and illnesses connected to lifestyle factors, such as diet and smoking-related heart disease and lung disease and obesity-related conditions such as type II diabetes.

To think that people taking their kids to the GP too often with a cold is where the money is going in the NHS is mistaken.

I think that if you are worried about your childrens health in any way,you should take them to the Drs.

Percentage share of GP budget as a total of the entire NHS budget is around 8% IIRC. There is a serious argument that if more was spent on resourcing general practice then it would save substantially larger amounts elsewhere in the NHS. There is also a GP recruitment crisis, with very few medical students wanting to go into GP training. (Did you know that GPs are technically not NHS employees but independent contractors?) Increases in GP workload are highly linked to increases in complex health conditions as the population ages.

Other than when he was tiny and under gp care for slow weight gain I think every time I've taken ds to Dr has been because 111 has advised it.

I'm actually the mother referenced earlier who took ds to gp fog stubbed toe
I didn't notice him hurting it and his nail went yellow them brown. I thought it may be infected and was advised to take him to gp. Was actually just a bruise under the nail but gp was adamant I was right to bring him in to be on the safe side.

Landrover I'm so sorry.

Darkforces did you read landrover''s post?

Sorry for your loss landrover

Sorry for your loss landrover

I don't know anyone who goes all the time unless it's required. I think I probably went too often when Ds was small but he had infection after infection and was hospitalised twice in his first 6 weeks so I was nervous.

I tend not to take my dc regularly now although dd (4) has had an ear infection and scarlet fever in February so I had to take her then.

Tbh though if I'm worried or a parent I know is worried if always say get them checked. Also keep on getting them checked if you're not happy. I was told Ds (then 3) was fine but after 4 doctor visits they discovered pneumonia.

It's very easy to be blasé about things if you've never had your faith in your judgement / the medical professionals judgement tested.

I hate the 'unless a severed limb I don't seek medical advice because I can cope and am a better mum' brigade...

I think some people do.
But I've had similar experiences to others. Apologetic visits to be told she needs to go to A&E right now. Why hadn't she been brought in earlier?
Got air ambulanced out once...
With very young children I think GPs are happy to err on the side of caution.

It costs me 60 quid to see a GP. Believe me only go when I have to. I have been a lot. Never for anything you have described.

Yanbu, I know someone who has taken a child to the doctors 3 times and the hospital once in the last week. The kid has chicken pox. Not a bad dose, bog standard, a bit poorly certainly but eating, drinking as normal, chicken pox.
I know of people my sister whos children are there for every sniffle. It's ridiculous.

Hmmm. DD was seriously ill a while back but it took me 3 trips to 3 different doctors before she was correctly diagnosed and transferred to hospital for life-saving surgery. That said, I do think some people are over-cautious.

I'd remind everyone that a lot of minor ailments can be dealt with by a pharmacist. Certainly when I suspected DS had chickenpox I went to the pharmacist who confirmed my suspicions and gave me advice.

I find it very difficult to judge when to take my dcs to the GP. Sometimes I take them when there is little wrong and sometimes I get the evil eye because I haven't taken them earlier. I genuinely can't seem to make the right call and it may be partly because I literally was never taken to the GP as a child. My dm didn't believe in illness and I never had a day off school either.

I took my dd to the doctor with what I thought was chicken pox but she was only 9 months old. Is that overdoing it?

I try not to take her unless I am extremely worried or insure but I think yabu for being judgey about this. Especially first time mums worry and who wants to be the parent who didn't have something checked out and then it turns out to be serious.

Well done you for being the perfect, confident , self assured parent.