Nov. 22--PLANO, TEXAS --
Katie Hazlewood is like most young mothers--always concerned about her baby--4 month old Charlotte.
"The first time she had a stuffy nose she was six weeks old," Katie said. "For me, I thought the world was coming to an end."
Before the cough and cold medicines were pulled from the market--concerned parents would rush to the drug store to make their kids feel better--but too many of the kids would end up in the emergency room.
According to a Centers for Disease Control study--since the medicines were volutarily pulled the number of emergency room visits for kids 2 years-of-age and under dropped by more than half--from 2,800 to 1,250.
Dr. Lawrence Hum is the Emergency Department Medical Director at Texas Health Plano where he said the recall has kept many kids out of the ER.
"Because of the accessibility of these cough-cold medicines parents would just buy it and give what they thought might be appropriate without the direction of a pediatrician thereby causing some bad side effects for these infants," Dr. Hum said.
Side effects included excessive drowsiness, rapid heart beat and convulsions.
Before and after the recall most of the ER visits were the result of overdoses with more than half of the kids accidentally ingesting the medicine on their own-
Texas Health Resources Plano pediatrician Angela Mix said keeping all medications out of the reach of kids is still key.
"Having all medications, wether they are your or our childs locked up out of reach and they are talking about actually having better labeling, better administration, better droppers or spoons you can get confused between teaspoons and tablespoons," Dr. Mix said.
That's a difference of 10cc's and DR. Mix said for kids under two it can be dangerous.
As for Katie--anything to make health decisions for Charlotte easier--the better.
"She's my one and only," Katie said. "I want to make sure she's okay."
The study appears in the December 2010 issue of Pediatrics.
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