When my son is not bad enough to stay at home
Not all diseases require a child to stay at home. In some cases, prevention is only required to prevent the spread of the disease to others. Knowing something about how some diseases spread and taking precautions to reduce the transmission of diseases can help you make better decisions about your children's health to take them to school or not.
Seen good to go to school
As a general rule, if a child can perform normal activities without getting tired, is eating and drinking normally and has no fever, diarrhea or vomiting, can attend school. Just make sure they rest a little longer until they are 100% recovered.
Keep in mind that being fever free means not having a fever when you do not take acetaminophen or ibuprofen. Some parents administer paracetamol or ibuprofen to children to reduce fever before sending them to school. This is problematic for two reasons:
1. If a child has a fever, it is because there is an infection in their body. When the body is fighting an infection, it is more susceptible to contracting another disease. That means that a child who goes to school with a medicated fever can get a more serious illness.
2. Send a child to school with a medicated fever It means that it can be contagious and spread your disease to others without knowing it.
When considering how to keep children in school, the saying goes: prevention is better than cure. Helping children learn how to care for their bodies from an early age will help keep them healthy and will start them on the right path to learn to take care of themselves. In general, this increases the number of days children are in school and learn.
Prevention: the best way not to get sick
The prevention of illness is the best way to keep children in school. Children can be taught from an early age to develop skills that will keep them healthy on a day-to-day basis. Modeling these behaviors for children is the best way to help them understand their importance and how to implement them in their daily activities.
Hand washing. Teach your children to wash their hands correctly and frequently. Children (really, everyone) should wash their hands:
- Before meals
- Before preparing food
- Before touching your eyes, nose or mouth (for example, blowing your nose, brushing your teeth, removing contact lenses)
- After using the bathroom
- After being on the street
- After touching animals
- After traveling by public transport
- After sneezing or coughing
How to wash your hands well:
1. Wet hands with clean running water and apply soap.
2. Rub the hands paying special attention to the back, between the fingers and under the nails.
3. Rub hands together for at least 20 seconds. Children can be taught that they have to sing Happy Birthday twice in a row to measure the correct amount of time.
4. Rinse both hands with running water. Tell the children that the germs on their hands "go" down the drain.5. Dry your hands with a clean towel.
If the hands are not visibly dirty and we do not have running water to wash our hands, the children should be encouraged to use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer.
Protecting others
Children can learn techniques to prevent the spread of disease to others, especially during the incubation period (the time before the symptoms appear, but when the disease is already in the body).
1. Encourage children to sneeze into their elbow Instead of your hands to prevent the spread of germs to others.
2. Shave children how to clean their noses with a handkerchief of paper instead of rubbing your hand or arm with your nose.
3. Teach children to wash their hands after using the bathroom.
4. Teach children to wash their hands after blowing their nose or sneezing.
Protect themselves
In addition to proper and timely hand washing, children can reduce the number of infections they have:
1. Keeping your hands away from your eyes, nose and mouth. This is where the germs enter more often in the body. This can be particularly difficult in children who bite their nails.
2. Teach children not to share Bottles, food, lip balms or candy can diminish the routes through which germs enter the body.
3. Eating a healthy and balanced diet to support a good immune system.
4. Sleeping enough to get adequate rest.
Deanna Marie Mason, expert in education and family health. Author of the blog Dr. Deanna Marie Mason. An educational approach to adaptation
It may interest you:
- Children in the nursery: 10 febrile processes per year
- Childhood diseases: what should be communicated in school?
- Diarrhea in babies
- Childhood otitis, when is a drainage in the ears necessary?
- How to prevent conjunctivitis
