Hi, I'm Doctor David Hill, and today we're going to talk about how to cure fever in infants. Now, to talk about that we, first of all needed to find an infant and we needed to find a fever. The fever that worries the very most occurs in a baby who is less than three months of age. That would be a newborn. A newborn fever can be very concerning and often requires hospitalization to address. The most significant of these fevers occurs in babies who are under one month of age. Up to four weeks, any fever occurring in an infant is almost guaranteed to lead to at ;east a twp day hospitalization. Why is that? Well, that may be the only sign that we have that that baby has a very serious infection of the blood stream or the brain or the urine that requires IV antibiotics. And we often don't know until we get all of our studies back; a process which can take two days. So, what is a fever in that baby? Ideally, we'd get a rectal temperature. If that temperature is greater than 100.4 degrees, or 38.0 degrees centigrade, Celsius. we consider that a fever. But honestly, if it's anywhere close to that. If you're getting one over a hundred, go ahead and bring your baby in to see the doctor, because maybe that you missed that fever when it was at its height. Your doctor's going to want to recheck. likewise, in newborns a temperature under ninety seven degrees rectal is just as alarming if not more alarming for all the same reasons. Now, for the next couple of months of like, fever remains very concerning and often requires hospitalization. But, you've got a little bit more wiggle room to look for a cause. So, definitely bring your baby in to the doctor, if they're under three months of age and have a fever. However, there's some possibility that you're baby will not necessarily be hospitalized under those circumstances, depending what the doctor sees on exam. Now, in babies over age three months, you've got a slightly different scenario. The questions are, how high is the fever, how long has it been going on, and is there an obvious source for the fever. A fever over a hundred five degrees rectal, would suggest that we need to see that baby immediately. That's probably significant illness. We don't what, because we haven't seen the baby yet, but it deserves an immediate evaluation to see what's going on. The fever itself is not going to harm your baby, but whatever is causing the fever, may well. For a fever between 104 and 105, we're still concerned enough that we really want to see that child within twenty four hours of the fever starting. However, it's not quite considered as emergent as a fever over 105. For fevers under 104, if it goes on for twenty four hours or more, and there's not an obvious cause, again, we're going to want to assess the baby. Why is that? Well, the most common cause of those fevers, is a urinary tract infection. And if it's causing a fever, we think it's involving the kidney. That is a dangerous infection that may cause kidney damage, sometimes permanent kidney damage, and it needs to be appropriately treated. So, the simplest fevers are those in babies who do not have a fever over a 104 degrees, and have an obvious cause of fever. So, maybe your baby has a runny nose, stuffy nose, cold; it's okay in those cases to let the fever go for a couple days, before bringing the baby to the doctor. Actually, three days of fever may be quite normal. However, if your baby is tugging at his or her ear, seems excessively fussy, isn't eating very well, seems to be having any problem at all with breathing, that's still a child who should see the doctor. So, bottom line, under the age of one year, I have a really low threshold for evaluating a fever. Under the age of three months, I have to see it immediately. And under one month, it is absolutely emergent. Also, over 105, emergent. Talking about dealing with fever in infants, I'm Doctor David Hill.
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