DS covered in red spots but no blistering... so if it's not chickenpox, what is it?

[fromheretomaternity]

DS (9 months) was feeling poorly on Saturday - he had a fever and was generally unhappy. He got a few red spots that day (on his torso), and more spots on Sunday. They are raised red spots, and are not bunched together. Took him to the GP Monday, who insisted it was not chickenpox as there was no blistering, also by then DS was quite well in himself. GP said it was an unidentified viral rash.

It's Tuesday now - some of the original spots have crusted over with tiny dots on top, but the spots have spread to his arms and face. He still seems ok though, no fever and no itching.

What on earth is it? Can he have chickenpox without blistering/itching?

If the rash has changed then personally I would go back to the GP (or a different GP in the practice if you think that the initial one wasn't helpful)

Rashes are very hard to diagnose. My dd has had several viral rashes (normally accompanied by a temp and cold symptoms initially). To my untrained eye they certainly looked like c/pox but the GP said otherwise (and turned out to be right)

Piriton (advised by the GP) got rid of dd's rash but I think your ds is too young for piriton iirc.

Mine had something which sounds just like this. He had a very high fever, and then a couple of days later came out in a rash. We also though chickenpox/measles, but apparantly it's quite common for children to get these rashes as a result of some unidentified virus.
The doc gave us some anti-allergy drops (which I don't think made any difference at all) but as ds was basically feeling fine we just waited it out. It took 3 days, and in that time he swelled up like you wouldn't believe, there was hardly any part of him that wasn't covered in red bumpy rash, it was horrible to look at!
But it really didn't seem to bother him, and it faded away to nothing

it hasn't changed, it's just moved to different parts of his body.

i'd never even heard of a "viral rash" before. do you have any web references? Is it infectious? (hope not, DS went to music class this morning...)

I would say its something viral. My dd has been very ill for about a week now, high temperatures, cough, headache but yesterday seemed fine. Until the afternoon when suddenly the colour drained from her face and she developed spots all around her mouth and eyes and she started wailing she was so unwell After a rough night and lots of ibuprofen she seems much better today but I was so worried. I would go to the GP to put your mind at rest- I know had the spots developed in office hours I would have walked her straight there.

I did try to google viral rash but got loads of confusing information. (technically c/pox and other infectious illnesses are characterised by a viral rash.)

In my dd's case the GP said that her rash definitely wasn't infectious. Obviously I can't say if your ds's is or not.

Hope you get some more helpful answers.

I'd never heard of it before either, but here (I am in Germany) EVERYONE who saw my ds at his most rashiest said "oh yes, my dd/ds had that - it's the post-viral rash and goes in 3 days" or words to that effect. And it def. was not infectious.

I think with my ds it looked much, much worse than it was - he hardly noticed it, and it didn't seem to be either itching or burning. If it was, I'd have taken him straight back to the docs.

any other symptoms like sre throat an bright red tongue?