Mothers are often affected by customs and culture in dealing with their infants. In doing so, they may unintentionally do something that harms their babies. Here we will mention a number of mistakes that some mothers make:
First: Using ice to treat a child’s fever. When a child has a fever this means that he has inflammation that may be caused by viruses, germs or parasites. Fever is part of the body's defense mechanism to resist these causes, especially germs and viruses. Slight increases in temperature (at 36.5 or 37.5 degrees) do not affect the body while high temperatures may exhaust the child and affect his health. Thus, in the second case something should be done to reduce the temperature.
The skin that contains pores and glands is the most important outlet for the temperature, because these pores and glands actively release heat from the body if it increases inside the body as what happens in case of inflammation or hot weather. However, they are closed and prevent temperature from being released in cold weather. Nonetheless, if the production of heat inside the body is quick, the speed of losing temperature automatically slows down; hence, something should be done to reduce it. In such cases, the following measures should be taken:
1. Remove the child’s clothes, except that which is light and loose.
2. Put the child in an open, well-ventilated place.
3. Let him drink a lot as the body loses a great amount of liquid when the temperature rises.
4. The child should be given an anti-pyretic medicine that would reduce the temperature, every 4 to 8 hours in the following 24 hours, even if the fever went down after taking the first dosage.
5. Sometimes the aforementioned steps are not useful enough and the child will continue to suffer from fever. In that case, water should be used to reduce the temperature and this can be done in two ways: The first way, is to use water compresses on the chest, head and stomach or wrap the child's arms and legs with it. This compress should be changed every five minutes. It is wrong to use ice or cold water as this makes the skin shrink like what happens in winter, and the glands that eject heat are closed and so the secretions that cool the body become less. The second way is to put the child under water for fifteen minutes with the exception of his head. After that his body should be dried and he should wear loose light clothing. He should be kept away from any breeze, especially air conditioners.
Second: Heating the infant’s milk bottles. A British medical magazine report mentioned that heating infants’ milk bottles by putting them in a pot containing boiling water increases the danger of burns in the infant’s mouth and palate. The report entitled “The lesson of the week” mentioned that medical checkups between 1995 and 1998 in Queen Victoria Hospital in East Grinstead that were conducted by a medical team headed by Dr. Stephen Jeffery asserted that burns due to heating milk bottles in pots containing boiling water were extremely alarming. He said that the cases that were recorded by the medical team may be just the tip of the iceberg. The report also indicated the danger of using microwaves to heat milk bottles as they do not heat the milk equally, and this misleads the mother and may cause mouth burns. The report confirmed that many burn cases that reach the hospital are because of mistakes made when heating milk bottles.
Third: Using Kohl or infants. Kohl is a common cosmetic preparation and usually contains a poisonous substance called lead. When adults use it on normal skin it does not cause harm as it does not penetrate the body. However, in our society Kohl is not only used for adults but also for children as an eyeliner and as an antiseptic for the navel and a relief for toothache. It could also be one of the components of folk medicine and can be used as a pain killer and for many other incorrect uses. The danger of using Kohl for infants is that it is put directly on the membranes of the mouth or the navel and then it is absorbed into the body. Lead is poisonous and it precipitates in many parts of the body causing permanent harm especially in the nervous system. The symptoms of poisoning may start in the form of convulsions or mental retardation later on.