giving antibiotics at night?

[GirlWiththeMouseyHair]

DS 14mo is on a course of penicillin, 5mls 4x a day which, provided he doesn't wake at some point in the night (which we're expecting), means we need to give a dose in the night.

Is it possible to do this without waking him? Can you water down the 5mls and give like a dream feed in a bottle?

I think its a no for the bottle thing in case they don't finish all of it which is important esp with antibiotics.

Why you can't get 4 doses in over a 12 hour period? Massive assumption on hours of waking here, but I'm sure you see what I mean!

the doctor and pharmasist said dose him up every 4-6hours, he's also on ibruprofen and paracetemol...happily do it in his 11-12 waking hours if it's safe to!

anyone know if it's safe to give antibiotics over 12 hours instead of 24?

Ummm, well I always thought that they meant during the waking hours when they said that!

Hopefully someone else more knowledgable than me will be along in a minute!

Hope your DS gets better soon!

thankyou, poor mite. Trouble is if we only give it to him during waking hours, that's more like every 3 hours?

I'll have to keep bumping this cos I am thoroughly confused, because what you are saying makes sense, but is not how I do it!!

Where is everyone?

have you given antiobiotics this way to your dc's then? Hell, I'll take that! if that's the norm it's clearly me with pfb syndrome, would rather not wake him!

The aim is to keep a constant level of antibiotics in their system, hence the ideal is a dose every 6 hours, rather than cramming them into 12 hours. We tend to wake them up - so a dose on waking, one at lunch time, one before they go to bed, and one when we go to bed. But I did once ask a doctor about this, who said doing it over 12 hours would probably also be fine.

Give the anti-biotics during the day.

I assume the 'dose him up' comment is about the neurofen/calpol and not the abs.

I try to time the painkillers so that I can give a dose of neurofen just before I go to bed as this, I find, is easier to give by the syringe to a sleepy child.

This dose, generally, lasts until early next morning.

Hope that helps

DD 3.5 was on a 10 day course over Christmas. I did it in approximately 6 hourly doses as she tends to be up and about at around 6 or 6.30 in the morning. I would rouse her gently at midnight or thereabouts and she'd be so sleepy that she'd go straight back to sleep. I was always under the impression that the meds needed to be given at regular intervals so I think this does mean waking in the night.

thanks so much, he hates taking any medicine, will go out for syringes tomorrow, so waking is last option as it will take FOREVER to get him back to sleep

am confused.......

You might be surprised. ds is a horror at going back to sleep if he wakes up, but if we wake him (and he's in a deep sleep, which he usually is at that time of night) then he's fine. And we don't really wake him - we just roll him on to his back, put the syringe in his mouth and gently drip it in. He's had a lot of antibiotics over the last year, and we've not had a problem yet settling him back down.

Hi GWMH (I remember you from our AN/PN thread!)
I was very confused about this, too. I've had to give antibiotics when ds had pneumonia about 2 months ago (I think it was 2 months ago) anyway, the GP and pharmacist told me to only administer the antibiotics during waking hours. That meant every 3 rather than 4-6 and that was ok. As long as there was a space in between doses of a few hours and he got all 4 doses in a day. Don't wake him to give it to him... that will just interrupt his sleep and make you all more tired!

girl - my ds constantly had ear infections so I became a bit of an expert on dosing him up. I got one of those syringe things (they come with the bottles of baby nurofen) and I'd use that to give him the antibiotics and then another one for whichever pain killer I was using.

The antibiotics he was one were 4 x a day and the dr made it clear that it was far preferable to space it out and dose over the whole 24 hours. So I did midnight, 6am (or slightly later - he woke at 6.30ish) - midday and 6pm.

Which meant only one night time waking and to be honest with the syringe thing he really did settle back easily as I'd just squirt it in!

Hope that makes sense

As for syringes - we needed one when ds was younger and we asked at the pharmacy and they just handed us one. I thought that was really nice We now just give it on a spoon. I've found recently that if I hold it out on the spoon during a meal and let him decide to try it, it goes down easier. So, I'm holding it there with medicine on spoon for about 15 seconds and he opens his mouth and shows he wants it.
Call your GP in the morning and ask this question if you're still wondering. I guess different gps say different things and feel badly for giving advice now that I've read hellsbells.

We always tell our patients that during normal waking hours is fine.
every 6 hours is the actual ideal dosing time but 4 hourly is totally acceptable,as it is counter productive to waken them . The plasma level will be ok on a four hourly regimen but i wouldnt go down to a 12 hour routine as the previous dose will not have cleared the system and you will get an additive effect and increase possible side effects,
Most pharmacies will give you a syringe if you ask for one with the medicine,we always offer one.

counter productiveness of waking a baby to give anitbiotics proved last night - took 3.5hours to get sobbing DS back to sleep.

Now don't know what to do. Fine if he wakes in the night we'll give it to him but if he doesn't I really don't want to wake him so this means trying to fit 4 doses into 12hours or less

oh no - that's rough. My DS seemed to sleep much deeper at certain times and that is when I tried to sneak in a dose as he was far less likely to wake up.

Is there a time that your DS is less easy to wake? Maybe you could structure it round that (does that make any sense?)

i think the trouble is waking him from a deep sleep, it takes a lot to wake him but we had to lift and turn him over as he sleeps on his tummy