Help! Paracetemol and 13 year old worry

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My DS tested positive for covid yesterday & is feeling rough. He’s nearly 14 and I gave him 2X 500 mg of paracetemol rather than 1 as I got the bloody boxes mixed up - he should have hav 2X 250mg . Aibu to worry?

The dosage is 10-15 year olds is 1 tablet and then over that it’s adult dose. FFS- I can’t believe I did it- it’s the anxiety over covid etc.

He'll be absolutely fine!!!!

Don’t worry that’s fine

Thanks- it’s added to my already through the roof anxiety 🤪

It's fine. I remember a doctor comparing me to my 14 year old son to me when I questioned whether a child really should be taking an adult dose of paracetamol. I'm smaller than lots of children, but I wouldn't think twice about taking a full dose.

Work put what he should have over 24 hours - I'm guessing 4x500mg. Make sure he doesn't exceed that, and take a deep breath. Might also be worth getting some ibuprofen in - when my 12 yr old had covid he was on max dose of paracetamol and ibuprofen for a few days.

FWIW, once you've finished the smaller tablets, considerceveryone have 500mg tablets - one for kids, two for adults. You can snap paracetamol in half if you want a smaller dose for the kids sometimes.

It should be based on weight rather than age. I think the dosage is 15mg/kg/dose.

As above, it’s weight based. If he’s over 50 kg 1 g x 4 times a day is normal dose

At that age I had fixed braces and took that dose of paracetamol multiple times a month to deal with the headaches they caused, it's absolutely fine. That is well under the potentially toxic dose.

My 13 year old ds is bigger than me. While I wouldn't deliberately give him an adult dose, I wouldn't be too worried if he took it by accident

This resource is quite good for assessing risk during this type of incident:

www.poison.org/

I gave my baby ds double the ibuprofen dose by mistake. I phoned 111- they said not to worry unless it was 10 * the dose! I’m sure your ds will be fine.

I used to worry about that till my dsis pointed out that she takes 2 paracetamol in one dose and weighs less than my 13 year old ds.

Yes, the cut off for dose is 50kg (so light adults under 50kg also shouldn't have the adult dose)- my nearly 14y old is still quite small so is still still under 50kg but I'd say most of his friends would be over that by now. I usually give him 750mg if he needs a once off for something but 500mg if he's having more than one dose in the day - prone to sports injuries so gets it quite often!

What does he weight?
I've worked in medical research and the standard, minimal 'adult' weight for medication is based on 50kg. If he is around this or above, fine. Even if he is slightly less than this, I wouldn't be concerned unless there are repeated doses and he is significantly smaller than this.

I'll be honest I have dd ( 13 ) adult dose when she needs it. She is the same height / weight as me.
I'm a nurse if that makes you feel any better 🤷‍♀️

Why aren't there any aspirin in the jungle?

Because the parrots eat em all.