Stomach Flu in Infants: What to Do If Your Baby Has Viral Gastroenteritis

The stomach flu, or viral gastroenteritis, is a very common and particularly nasty gastrointestinal infection, which can be caused by any one of a number of viruses (not the influenza virus, despite the common name of the disease). While not usually severe or life-threatening, the stomach flu can strike babies quite hard and frequently due to their under-developed immune systems. The symptoms can also reflect a potentially more serious bacterial infection, and dehydration is always a concern.
Fortunately, there are several options for both the treatment and prevention of the stomach flu in your child.

Know the signs and symptoms

When your baby has a stomach flu, the lining of the gastrointestinal tract becomes inflamed, producing symptoms including:

- Diarrhea
- Vomiting
- Abdominal pain
- Fever

How infections occur

The stomach flu is contracted through the consumption of contaminated foods, sharing cups or utensils with someone who is infected, or through direct contact with contaminated fecal matter (a fairly common occurrence among young children, especially in daycare centers). Viral gastroenteritis is the second most common infectious disease in America after the common cold, and babies usually suffer the disease 2-3 times per year; after the immune system increases in strength around the age of 3, this number decreases.

Treatment options

Most cases of viral gastroenteritis can be effectively treated through home remedies. If your baby is still breast-feeding, continue breast-feeding and provide plenty of fluids. Otherwise, provide plenty of fluids, but avoid drinking too much plain water, as this can exacerbate the situation of electrolyte imbalance. Instead, give rehydration drinks such as Pedialyte and warm soup broths. Start reintroducing solid foods into the diet slowly, starting with easy to digest foods such as pears, apples, oatmeal, and rice. Avoid dairy products, spicy foods, meats, and citrus fruits for at least 3 days after symptoms disappear.

When to call your doctor

Viral gastroenteritis can be quite problematic in very young infants, so you should call your doctor as soon as you notice your baby is vomiting, has a bloody stool, or seems excessively agitated for more than 2 days. In addition, dehydration is the most severe complication of viral gastroenteritis at any age. Be on the lookout for the following symptoms of moderate-severe dehydration:

- Sunken fontanel (soft spot)
- Wrinkled skin
- Sunken eyes
- Dry lips
- Crying without producing tears
- Lack of urination for more than 6 hours at a time

Prevention

The best treatment for the stomach flu, or for any infectious disease, is prevention. In the case of the stomach flu, prevention means avoiding contact with contaminated foods, objects, and people.

Daycare centers, school, and hospitals are usually full of germs, and should be avoided when possible, especially in the case of very young infants. Make sure that all food that you and your child consume is properly handled and cooked. Do not share cups, eating utensils, or plates with others. Disinfect hotspots for germ within the home, such as doorknobs and tabletops, frequently and thoroughly.

Amanda Maynes is an aspiring writer with a wealth of knowledge in the areas of health and fitness. She enjoys researching and writing about different topics with the aim of benefiting her readers.
To see more of Amanda's writing and to learn more about this topic, check out the following website: http://coldremedies.com/all-about-sinus-infections.html

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How To Make Baby Wipes Solution

Talk to a mother today about diapers, and she immediately thinks of the disposable ones. However, it was not too long ago that all diapers were made of cloth. With advent of disposable diapers came the handy dandy wipes with baby wipes solution. They first came on the scene around the 1970s, and they provided another convenience for mothers.

However, as women became more aware the environment and the chemicals that are used, they wanted to move back to those days of the cloth diaper. There preference was to protect their children from harsh, possible toxic chemicals in the things they were using to clean their child. They also, wanted to protect the environment.

In this day and age, one wonders why does a person need to spend the time to make this kind of solution. It is so much easier to purchase them already made. There are a variety of types that they can choose. So, what makes a mother decide to make her own, instead of using a premade one.

It is the usual route to look for convenience. However, in the long run making it takes no longer time than getting into the car, heading to the store to purchase. Sometimes, the price paid for convenience is hardly worth it, and store brands are filled with ingredients that are not always desirable.

Then there is the question of the environment. Every year, the landfills are becoming congested with plastics and disposable products. This only adds to the problem of pollution. When a mother makes her own cloth wipes, she knows that she is not adding to the problem.

The fact that many of the over the counter solutions are packed with chemicals. Some may argue that not all of them are loaded with chemical, but the truth is even the best ones have fragrances that could be harmful to the baby. Another thing to consider is that in this economic climate it makes better sense to cut back on cost, and this a good place to do it.

The average household uses three to four dozen wipes, and that is based on the fact that the diapers are wash regularly. It is so much easier to just pop them into the laundry. This way the mother knows that they are cleaned and sanitized. Another issue surrounding store bought ones is the one size fits all.

The size of them also causes a problem. Not all babies are the same size, and one size does not fit all. Homemade wipes give mothers better control how many to use. The best benefit of all is controlling what goes into the solution she uses to clean the baby. She does not have to worry about harmful chemicals and other things that might be harmful.

Mothers can feel secure knowing that by making her own baby wipes solution, she is protecting her baby and helping the environment as well. This is because the ingredients that she uses are better than the chemicals in the over the counter products. In the long run, it is a better solution to several problems.

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STOMACH AND BOWEL DISORDERS AMONG INFANTS

During infancy.
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For three or four weeks after birth the infant sleeps more or less, day and night, only waking to satisfy the demands of hunger; at the expiration of this time, however, each interval of wakefulness grows longer, so that it sleeps less frequently, but for longer periods at a time.

This disposition to repose in the early weeks of the infant's life must not be interfered with; but this period having expired, great care is necessary to induce regularity in its hours of sleep, otherwise too much will be taken in the day-time, and restless and disturbed nights will follow. The child should be brought into the habit of sleeping in the middle of the day, before its dinner, and for about two hours, more or less. If put to rest at a later period of the day, it will invariably cause a bad night.

At first the infant should sleep with its parent. The low temperature of its body, and its small power of generating heat, render this necessary. If it should happen, however, that the child has disturbed and restless nights, it must immediately be removed to the bed and care of another female, to be brought to its mother at an early hour in the morning, for the purpose of being nursed. This is necessary for the preservation of the mother's health, which through sleepless nights would of course be soon deranged, and the infant would also suffer from the influence which such deranged health would have upon the milk.

When a month or six weeks has elapsed, the child, if healthy, may sleep alone in a cradle or cot, care being taken that it has a sufficiency of clothing, that the room in which it is placed is sufficiently warm, viz. 60 degrees, and the position of the cot itself is not such as to be exposed to currents of cold air. It is essentially necessary to attend to these points, since the faculty of producing heat, and consequently the power of maintaining the temperature, is less during sleep than at any other time, and therefore exposure to cold is especially injurious. It is but too frequently the case that inflammation of some internal organ will occur under such circumstances, without the true source of the disease ever being suspected. Here, however, a frequent error must be guarded against,  that of covering up the infant in its cot with too much clothing throwing over its face the muslin handkerchief and, last of all, drawing the drapery of the bed closely together. The object is to keep the infant sufficiently warm with pure air; it therefore ought to have free access to its mouth, and the atmosphere of the whole room should be kept sufficiently warm to allow the child to breathe it freely: in winter, therefore, there must always be a fire in the nursery.

The child up to two years old, at least, should sleep upon a feather bed, for the reasons referred to above. The pillow, however, after the sixth month, should be made of horsehair; for at this time teething commences, and it is highly important that the head should be kept cool.

During childhood.
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Up to the third or fourth year the child should be permitted to sleep for an hour or so before its dinner. After this time it may gradually be discontinued; but it must be recollected, that during the whole period of childhood more sleep is required than in adult age. The child, therefore, should be put to rest every evening between seven and eight; and if it be in health it will sleep soundly until the following morning. No definite rule, however, can be laid down in reference to the number of hours of sleep to be allowed; for one will require more or less than another.regularity as to the time of going to rest is the chief point to attend to; permit nothing to interfere with it, and then only let the child sleep without disturbance, until it awakes of its own accord on the following morning, and it will have had sufficient rest.

The amount of sleep necessary to preserve health varies according to the state of the body, and the habits of the individual. Infants pass much the greater portion of their time in sleep. Children sleep twelve or fourteen hours. The schoolboy generally ten. In youth, a third part of the twenty-four hours is spent in sleep. Whilst, in advanced age, many do not spend more than four, five, or six hours in sleep.

It is a cruel thing for a mother to sacrifice her child's health that she may indulge her own vanity, and yet how often is this done in reference to sleep. An evening party is to assemble, and the little child is kept up for hours beyond its stated time for retiring to rest, that it may be exhibited, fondled, and admired. Its usual portion of sleep is thus abridged, and, from the previous excitement, what little he does obtain, is broken and un refreshing, and he rises on the morrow wearied and exhausted.

Once awake, it should not be permitted to lie longer in bed, but should be encouraged to arise immediately. This is the way to bring about the habit of early rising, which prevents many serious evils to which parents are not sufficiently alive, promotes both mental and corporeal health, and of all habits is said to be the most conducive to longevity.

A child should never be suddenly aroused from sleep; it excites the brain, quickens the action of the heart, and, if often repeated, serious consequences would result. The change of sleeping to waking should always be gradual.

The bed on which the child now sleeps should be a mattress: at this age a feather bed is always injurious to children; for the body, sinking deep into the bed, is completely buried in feathers, and the unnatural degree of warmth thus produced relaxes and weakens the system, particularly the skin, and renders the child unusually susceptible to the impressions of cold. Then, instead of the bed being made up in the morning as soon as vacated, and while still saturated with the nocturnal exhalations from the body, the bed-clothes should be thrown over the backs of chairs, the mattress shaken well up, and the window thrown open for several hours, so that the apartment shall be thoroughly ventilated. It is also indispensably requisite not to allow the child to sleep with persons in bad health, or who are far advanced in life; if possible, it should sleep alone.

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