Chickenpox and ibuprofen

[albairlanda]

Posing for traffic sorry.

I was at a neighbours house this evening and my husband has given our child who is 23 Months ibuprofen to go to bed. But he has chickenpox. He's on day 2. I'm really panicked as know this can cause terrible complications.

Anyone can reassure? He gave 5ml.

Keep an eye. Ring 111
if concerned. Anecdotally I gave my 2 1/2 year old ibuprofen as I genuinely didn’t know risk. He was fine - he is now 13.

He's in bed now. How do I keep an eye? Would you ring 111 now or just if their was a reaction?

What really pisses me off is that I went to a shop to specifically buy calpol yesterday and have told him why and many other times and he just doesn't ever listen to me.

From what I can Google, it would seem ibuprofen increases the risk of the pox getting dangerously infected. So you will need to keep an eye on the rash for signs of it getting infected. I'd imagine the risk of a one off dose vs continuous doses for days is different, IYSWIM?

I hate how much us mums seem to end up telling our DPs about stuff like chicken pox etc when half the time it's just stuff we're reading off the NHS site. It's their kid too, why don't they ever Google?!

It is incredibly rare for it to contribute to any complications.
It's not even completely proven that it does.

On advice of our doctor we gave my 2 year old ibuprofen while she had chicken pox as it was the only thing that kept her fever below 40 and that was a far more of a concern at the time. Ibuprofen kept her out of hospital.

My now 14 yo had chicken pox at 18 months old. At the time they were recommending that you gave them paracetamol and ibuprofen “turn about” to maximise the relief they could get.

Luckily it didn’t cause any complications but just to say she was ok.

It's one dose, keep an eye on him and don't give him any more. If you were 5/7 days in constantly giving it and he was really really unwell then yes I'd be worried.

However, he's asleep, it's one dose. Just try and use other methods to help him feel better, poxclin do a foam I think now? Oats in a sock in the bath can really soothe the skin. If he doesn't want it in the bath with him then out the oats in the sock and run the tap through it so attaching the sock to the taps. I think calamine lotion in the fridge can make him feel better

Ice lollies for his sore throat (chicken pox is also on the inside of the body at the same time)

Anyways my point is, it's one dose and yes it's not great, however the data shows it's prolonged usage of brufen during chicken pox, you can't really do trials on children so we don't know why brufen causes an issue during chicken pox and it's unethical to not tell parents the dangers of it.

That's so infuriating for you.

I would think one dose will be fine but keep even more of an eye than I'm sure you're doing already.