I have been far too generous with my cough drops this year- I am almost out and we've barely started cold season!
So now I've started with gargling salt water and a return visit will get a cough drop.
I was wondering about baking soda for reflux? Sometimes I have kids come in complaining of reflux and I've thought about keeping baking soda in my office to alleviate this. But is that considered a medication? If I can do salt water for throats, why not baking soda? Thoughts?
Technically, so are cough drops. And some OTC meds.
And the school lunch .
I'm one of those scaredy-cat moms who didn't give her kids Brach's candy or cough drops.
But my kids did choke on food. Once on a saltine cracker. Another time it was a piece of meat and even though I'm a nurse, I grabbed that little kiddo by the feet, hung him upside down, and used my finger to pry the meat from the back of his throat. It worked. Later in talking to a physician friend, he told me he did the exact same thing when his kid was choking on a hot dog.
A local kid choked on a hot dog at preschool. He was up walking around eating his hotdog and started choking. Went into the coat room for some reason and collapsed. By the time the teacher found him, it was pretty much too late. Even though the EMT's and doctor worked on him for a long time.
My daughter choked on staples . . . she opened a box of staples and put some in her mouth. I had no idea what she was chewing on and asked her to stick her tongue out. I swept all of them I could see out but one went down her throat and she started gagging. Of to the ER . . . only a mile away. Handed her off to the doc and by that time the staple was in her stomach. Xray showed it moved into her small intestine. He called Poison Control regarding just waiting it for it to come out the other end or surgery and they said wait it out. It came out the next day with no damage.
Spidey's mom- scary stories! Yikes! My dad's cardiologist's child choked and died on a grape (2 or 3 years old). I still cut my kids grapes and they are 11 and 7.
Spidey's mom- scary stories! Yikes! My dad's cardiologist's child choked and died on a grape (2 or 3 years old). I still cut my kids grapes and they are 11 and 7.
I cut up grapes as well. And we don't eat hot dogs but if we did, we'd cut them into little pieces for kids. That warning went through all the schools here after that little boy died.
When my kids were little, if someone offered them a hard candy, they would say "no thank you, I can't have choke candy."
But really, I choked on a butterscotch candy when I was a kid. Been paranoid ever since. Though I do give throat drops to the older kids. All it will take is ONE child to choke, and away that goes!
I also don't give them to kids with coughs, for fear of aspiration.
We can't pass out cough drops without a dr order which is fine with me. I'm in elementary so it would be a choking hazard plus I know I'd see a ton of kids asking for them. We can't give out candy in our district since we have all these nutritional regulations now. Plus another choking hazard. We do have a standing dr order for salt water gargles which help. I would not do baking soda without an order. Be careful of kids with nut allergies-there's a warning on the box of some brands that it may contain traces of nuts.
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JenTheSchoolRN, BSN, RN
3,035 Posts
Technically, so are cough drops. And some OTC meds.
And the school lunch
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