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Preventable Diseases of Children: Place

Great care must be exercised in treating for fever. There are two principal kinds. In outer or surface fever, the hands and feet are warm and the skin hot. Place cold applications to the head, hot water bottle to the feet and bathe in cold water. In case of inward fever the hands and feet are cold and the skin cool and pale and mottled.

Place cold applications at the head, a hot water bottle to the feet and bathe in hot mustard water to bring the blood to the surface. A sense of touch is unreliable as to fever. Every mother should have a clinical thermometer and ask her physician to instruct her in its use. Eruptions.--If the baby has any eruption or breaking out of the skin, consult the doctor promptly. Every rash is not prickly heat. It may be some serious disease like scarlet fever, smallpox or chickenpox and may require the promptest possible treatment.

Teething. I A few words as to baby's teething. The first teeth- PREVENTABLE DISEASES OF CHILDREN the two lower front ones are usually cut when the baby is from six to seven months old. Some babies cut their teeth with little trouble; others are restless, uneasy and wakeful.

The latter is especially the case if the baby is constipated.

The teeth are usually cut in pairs:

First the two lower (in the center), next the two upper, then the outside two above, then two below, next to those first cut. These teeth usually are all present by the twelfth month.

The cutting, however, does not always follow the above order, and all children do not cut their first teeth by the sixth or seventh month.

Symptoms of difficult teething are fever, restlessness, sleeplessness and, locally, swollen or tender gums.

There is often loss of appetite and thirst caused by fever. These symptoms are present only in severe cases. When a child's teeth begin to come, it should be given less food and more water. It will often take more food than it can digest because it is thirsty and the food is liquid. The result is diarrheal trouble due to intestinal irritation from over-feeding. This is often mistakenly supposed to be due to teething, whereas if babies are properly fed and hygienic rules observed, very few will have any bowel trouble during the first or second year regardless of whether teeth are coming or not.

For the sleeplessness and irritability which so often accompany teething, much can be done by the mother. Drugs should not be given, except under the direction of a physician. A hot foot bath will often have a soothing effect by relieving the congestion in the head and mouth. Mustard can often be added to the foot bath with benefit. A little castor oil will be beneficial, for a good movement of the bowels will relieve congestion in the gums. The mother's finger dipped in sirup of lettuce can be gently carried over the tender and inflamed gum, and now and then by a little firmer pressure may allow the point of the tooth to free its way through. The baby may be allowed to bite on a small chicken or ham bone, or if over nine months, on a piece of rare roast beef.

Beware of soothing sirups which merely "dope" the baby, and often cause great harm.

Constipation. If a bottle-fed baby is constipated, wash out the bowels with an enema of tepid water containing salt in the proportion of a level teaspoonful to the pint. Give one or two teaspoonfuls of castor oil.

If this does not afford relief within four hours consult your physician.

At this time you will be able to prevent a serious summer complaint with which the baby is threatened.

When the food does not agree with the baby it will fail to gain weight or will be constipated, have colic, "rolling of gases in the stomach" (flatulence), loose stools and diarrhea. Consult your doctor without delay. Remember the stitch in time. The fact that an infant under one year of age does not gain in weight may show that it needs a different kind of liquid food, but does not indicate that it requires any sort of solid food and under no circumstances should solid food be given to babies under twelve or thirteen months of age. In hot weather reduce the amount of food and give more water. Pour out about one-fourth of the milk, replace with water and make the feedings farther apart, giving water between. These simple rules are intended to help you take care of the baby when it is well and to prevent its becoming sick. But the first thing to do when the baby is sick is to send for your physician.

The home remedies above given will help you to check the trouble and keep it under control until the doctor comes and prescribes the proper course of treatment.