Which monitor for a baby who has febrile convulsions?

[GoldysMum]

my 13 month old has now had two of these, one of which was serious. If it had happened at night and not been spotted he would have died. I need a monitor that will enable me to check he is not having a convulsion. What should I go for? One with a video monitor? Or would any of the ones with sensors be appropriate in this situation?

Hi, I don't have a monitor recommendation but clicked on this as my DS has had 4 febrile convulsions. Two of which were long and needed drugs to stop them (after 25/30 mins) - we were with him on these occasions so I have no idea what would have happened had he been in bed.

Can I ask why you think he would have died if you hadn't spotted it - that might help with suggesting the right monitor.

I honestly don't know what you could use that won't have you up half the night with every movement or sitting glued to a television screen all night.

Hi there, thanks for your response. The drs and nurses around him (a team of about 10 in the resucitation room) said afterwards they had been 'pretty worried' and although they didn't say it they implied he could have died. His heart rate was way up and his oxygen levels were very low so needed help breathing. Three different drugs didn't stop it so they then called in a specialist aneathetist was called in to put him out. This stopped it and they did say without this he would have suffered brain damage. They did a brain scan to make absolutely sure. Luckily kids are resilient and less than a week later he is back to normal - however if I hear a cry I now rush in as I'm a bit of a wreck - I think I will be whatever but I'd rather see on a screen or have a sensor than keep rushing in to find my son laughing at his paranoid mum!

Oh it sounds very scary. My son too gets very low oxygen levels - his first one was long and they gave him Lorazepam to stop it and it made him stop breathing so he was on a ventilator for 12 hours after and oxygen the rest of the day. Luckily though he recovered really well and was crawling round the hospital within a couple of days!

I am shocked that it could have caused brain damage as I thought this was unheard of - making me feel very scared! But I am very pleased he is ok!

We were really paranoid about future convulsions after the first one (also at 13 months) and although he has had some more he's always recovered really well - better than we have anyway!

I suppose a video monitor might be the best thing, the movement ones are usually for very little newborns who generally stay in once place and can be monitored.

Good luck with everything, if you want to talk to anyone about this more please do PM me.