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A survey comparing attitudes
of doctors, nurses and parents towards treating fevers in children reveals
that parents tend to treat high temperatures much more aggressively than
health professionals do.
A low fever can actually benefit
a sick child, and the researchers attributed parental tendencies to "fever
phobia" -- a fear that fever is harmful -- which they say originated
after the introduction of anti-fever drugs like Tylenol.
A group of Israeli researchers
obtained their results from a questionnaire sent to more than 2,000 parents,
doctors and nurses regarding fevers in children older than 3 months. The
researchers defined fever as 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit above normal body
temperature, which is around 98.6 degrees. The survey included questions
on risks of fever, dosages of anti-fever drugs and when children should
be treated.
The investigators found that
only 43%
of parents knew that a fever below 100.4 degrees can be beneficial to
a child, in contrast to 86% of the doctors and
64% of the nurses who responded to the survey.
The majority of parents also
said they would treat a fever below 100.4 even if the child has no other
symptoms, something with which only 11% of doctors agreed.
A fever can actually help sick
children. The body basically, is trying to do the right thing. Bugs like
to live at body temperature. So if you raise the temperature, you kill
them off. And contrary to what parents may believe the body can function
very efficiently at temperatures as high as 100.5 degrees.
While seizures from fevers
are scary for parents, a previous study showed febrile seizures caused
no long-term neurological damage. In contrast,
fever-related seizures only occur at very high temperatures -- around
108 degrees.
In the case of fever-related
seizures, parents should be more concerned that meningitis or bacteria
in the blood may be causing the seizure than the child's fever.
Patient Education and
Counseling January 2002;46:61-65
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