111 guy told me to give DD Ibuprofen with chickenpox wtf??

[ARRGHHHHHxxxxx]

Cut a long story short.

DD has severe chickenpox. Has temp, needed advice so called 111. Spots started showing Wednesday 2 days ago.

Spoke to a lady, who took details said another person was gonna call me. Another lady called and said my DD needs to be seen as she requested photos so I sent them. She said someone will call me to be seen. A guy rung and this part of the convo went like this.

111 guy: Have you given Calpol
Me: yes
111 guy: what about Ibuprofen
Me: ibuprofen?
111 guy: yes
Me: you can't give that to a child with chicken pox
111 guy: erm yes you can depends on the stage
Me: I'm not giving her ibuprofen I know not to give a child it for chickenpox, it states it on the NHS website.

Imagine if this was a first time mum not knowing what was right and what isn't. I'm fuming.

I gave both ibuprofen and calpol to both my babies this year when they had severe chicken pox and a temperature and it helped loads

Having seen a picture (on here I’m sure!) of a poor girl who was given ibuprofen when suffering with chickenpox I would avoid it unless desperate. It can force the virus deeper in the skin and this poor girl had big, deep holes in her skin. ☹️

Well this is new to me but my kids are adults now so maybe the guidance was different back then.

Yeah, I know someone who gave it to her dd with chicken pox. It was awful

Unless advised by a Dr, well I wouldn't be giving it. Especially if the dr hadn't even examined my child

This article is worth a read to put things in perspective.

This!

I’ve found the link, I’ll warn everyone it’s not pretty though. Rereading, they were let down several times IMO.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/childrens_health/2890589-Oops-Chicken-pox-and-Ibuprofen

Exactly why I was surprised he told me to give it to her. He claims he was a doctor but he could of been anyone.

Doctors don't know everything about every illness. Most will obviously advise ibuprofen or paracetamol when it comes to a child with serious fever or pain. This guy made a mistake or in his medical opinion felt it was worth the (tiny) risk in order to alleviate discomfort. So who cares? Either give it or don't give it, use your gut instinct.

Chicken pox/ibuprofen is one of those typical tidbits of information that mums learn on Facebook or baby groups and then gatekeep with absolute outrage when a supposed medical professional gets it wrong.

Having seen a picture (on here I’m sure!) of a poor girl who was given ibuprofen when suffering with chickenpox I would avoid it unless desperate.

With respect, how could anyone have known how serious the scars would have been had she not been given ibuprofen? Some children get hit very hard regardless of medication and others get off lightly.

How do I know that the advice from Confusedotcomm is helpful? Anyone can post on here giving supposingly helpful advice when it isn't. Please read other posts. I've had another person call me now and they have clarified that Ibuprofen is not recommended unless seen in person.

Yeah, I believe that's how they recruit at 111. The only skill you need is to be able to claim you're a doctor. That's it. Literally no checks whatsoever.

Exactly what I was thinking! Someone calling from 111 is definetely just joe bloggs from the pub!

Did he actually recommend you give it? In the conversation you stated above he asked if you had given it, which is quite a different thing.

The scare story from that thread was from someone whose daughter had high fever with convulsions due to CP and was told to take Nurofen and Calpol by the doctors. Firstly, not all children get convulsions from CP which sounds very severe. That poor girl clearly had a serious bout of the virus before she was given any medication. She went on to develop one of "worst rashes the nurse had ever seen". However it's not outside the realm of possibility that she would have had that rash because she was ALREADY seriously ill with CP before the parents called for advice.

Please people, correlation is not causation. One anecdotal case is not proof especially if there was no control person (another genetically similar child with the same severity of illness who didn't get ibuprofen and ended up with a milder case).

Read the conversation again. He said yes I can give it.

Please don't report. What are you doing to say? "I know better than the fully qualified Dr because I read the NHS website"??

I think it’s about weighing up the pros and cons. Yes ibuprofen can cause skin infections in chicken pox, but it’s not common. However, if a child is very poorly with a raging temperature, and paracetamol isn’t bringing it down, then personally I would risk the ibuprofen as the lesser of the evils. I imagine the doctor assumed that having called 111, your child must have fallen into the “very poorly with raging temperature” category.
I’ve been a GP for 25 years.

She'd also uploaded photos so presumably he could see her skin and made a judgement based on that.

@ARRGHHHHHxxxxx what do you mean by "he could have been anyone"?! You rang 111... You spoke to a Doctor... Who else could he have been? Very strange.

My 3 week old (under 5kg) was given ibuprofen in hospital when he had chicken pox along with another illness and his temp hadn't come down with calpol. So that was 2 contraindications, but he's fine. Sometimes it's about weighing up the pros and cons 🤷‍♀️

It was the lady before him that saw photos.

Read the previous messages from other posters about recruiting.

Ive been advised by a Dr in A&E to give Ibuprofen with chickenpox when temp was crazy high & paracetamol not cutting the mustard. Id been avoiding it up to that point. So I think Drs will recommend it in certain instances, and that was the Registrar over the phone to the F2, so they hadn’t seen in person. So it doesn’t seem completely contraindicated in certain instances

People in a 111 call centre are not doctors. They are call operators. They are no better than using Dr Google.

Then he shouldn't of told me he was a doctor.