[widgit]

How often can a 15 mo old be sick with high fevers and still be considered "normal"?

Dominic gets fevers every 3 weeks and they always run over 103. Last night's fever was 104.2. I'm getting mixed messages from doctors and I'm looking for other moms & dads to tell me how often their child got sick. (I know you cannot offer medical advice, just anecdotal evidence.)

Our PCP says that seems a little often for fevers that high and wrote a script for a full blood work-up to be drawn the next time he spiked a fever. The dr stressed the blood needed to be drawn as soon as we recognized the high fever. She indicated that she was trying to rule out something that started with nu----. I started to ask, "What's that?" but then stopped and said, "No I don't want to know yet because all I can do until the blood test is worry."

Well, kids don't get their highest fevers at 10 am on a Tuesday, KWIM? So last night I take him to our outpatient/ urgent care children's hospital and discover it closed at 7pm. I take him to the ER at children's hospital, but they won't draw blood without seeing a doctor (even though I have the script with me). 5 hours later the doc says this is totally normal, he's fine, go home. I've spent a ton of money, kept a sick child up way too late, and exposed him to much worse.

**How often did your 1 yr old get sick & did he/she typically run 103/104 deg fevers that often?

TIA

[StorkWatcher]

I don't have good practial advice, but just wanted to say that I think this sounds extreme. I'd call your doctor and tell them (if you haven't already) about your ER experience and ask if you should do something different next time.

It must be getting confusing with all the differing opinions, but I would definitely keep after it or try to get a referral to someone who can help. At least he's not experiencing any febrile seizures yet, right?

Sorry you're having to be so frustrated! Hopefully someone here can relate soon some practical experience.

[widgit]

He has had a febrile seizure. It freaked me out.

[thediva320]

I don't have much to offer, but I can say I am very sorry for all the stress you are going through. As a rule of thumb, I say if a temp is at 102 and stays there, take them to the ER. If nothing else, they are equipped with bringing the fever down before a seizure happens. Is your child teething? I know that fevers are common with teething, not sure how high they get as mine never got them, but just a thought. It seems strange to me that your doctor isn't giving you much more insight on what you can do to help your child when the fever occurs. I agree with Stork, contact the dr and find out how you can get the blood drawing taken care of in the event that you need to go to the dr. again. I hope this gets better soon, I can imagine how frazzled you must be. Hugs!

[numbr1dbcksfan]

What about urinary/renal reflux. My daughter still has this and even the slighted UTI makes her fever spike...

Note: if you are getting the run around, you can always test the urine yourself... then if they are off color bring them in to the office with you..

[intladoptionblog]

I've written extensively about febrile seizures, as my son has had them. (Here's the link for the first one:
International Adoption Blog - Febrile convulsion) (There are many more, including print-out for easy reference, you can locate through the 'find' feature.)
Up until he passed his third birthday he also had fevers often...and with the threat of convulsions we were all always freaked out. The fevers usually developed into tonsillitis, but we also discovered he was a staph carrier, which we finally took care of by swabbing his nostrils with antibiotic cream for 10 days.
We ended up taking him out of preschool, as he was coming down with something every 2 to 3 weeks and we figured he'd be better off kept away from so many other kids...and germs...until he was better able to fend off the effects.
He's now 3.75 and hasn't been sick in months. He starts school in January, though, so we'll see how that goes.
Our daughter, on the other hand, has only had one slight fever in all of her 17 months and seems to throw off everything that comes her way.

[caltaylor]

When my son first started day-care, he became sick every 1-2 weeks (fevers, runny nose, coughing, etc). My ped said to expect this for at least the first 6 months at home.

At one point, when his temp was 104, I brought him to the emergency room. They checked his ears, nose, throat, took a chest x-ray, urine sample through a catheter, drew blood. The end result? Nothing. They could not even say that it was viral. Nothing. I gave him tylenol and motrin and brought the fever down. A few days later, I noticed several molars popping though.

Last July, I again went to the ER at night when he had a temp of 103, I could not get it down with tylenol/motrin, and he was crying for several hours straight. They gave him motrin and a popscicle, and the fever went down. Again, checked ears, nose and throat but I refused to let them do the x-ray. Next night, same scenario (I could not get temp down because he was vomiting). ER worked magic with THEIR motrin and a popscicle. Doctor told me that he did not need and x-ay and that I needed to relax...(thanks, Doc).

Spent several hundred dollars on popscicles and could find nothing wrong. A few days later, my sons incisors came in.

I think for my son, daycare did cause lots of colds/flus/etc. But, in our experience, that unexplained high fever seems to have been his teeth!

Coleen

[tinkerbell11599]

My daughter was diagnosed with a UTI in Korea and a few months after arriving here developed another one. We only found out because she spiked a 105 temp and was hospitalized for 3 nights because of it. She had a VCUG test a month before her hospitalization and it was fine no abnormalities with it or the ultrasound of her bladder and kidneys. Now anytime we suspected UTI or she has a temp of 101 or greater we have to bring her to the doctor to have her tested.

It's scary when those temps start climbing up and fever reducers don't bring them down.

Jen

[GCS]

Could your doctor have been talking about Neutropenia? This is when there is a low white blood cell count in the body. There is a condition (my husband's niece had it) in young children where the body does not make white blood cells on a consistant basis so once a month or so they are low and during that time the child is more vulnerable to catching colds, etc. One sign of this is a high fever at regular times during the month.
It is not that uncommon and most children outgrow it -she did. Usually by thier 3rd birthday.
That may be why he wanted the blood work done during her fever - check the white blood cell count during that time.

[mlb]

My son is now seven and still gets fevers that go over 104. We did go to the emergency room for them in the beginning, but now know that's just him when he gets sick. It got to the point that the doctor was testing for meningitis (not fun bloodwork). Now we give him popsicles as often as he wanted them and alternate the motrin and tylenol, per doctors orders.
BTW DS had the fevers often as well, for the first year he was home with us.