With the cold season upon us, and the recent studies showing the dangers of children's cold and cough meds, I figured I would start this thread. Post here with all your tried and true home remedies for those stuffy, coughy, snotty kiddos. Feel free to post any questions or concerns here as well and we can all help each other through those nasty cold germs here.

Great thread Fallon.

Vaporizors help a ton for breaking up mucus and helping them sleep better.
Also honey helps a scratchy throat and there are a million ways to give it to them - a plain teaspoon of honey, mixed in decaf tea if they will drink it, drizzled over a little scoop of vanilla ice cream, etc.

Oh and make sure they are washing their hands frequently with anti-bacterial soap if they have a cold otherwise a cold can easily turn into an infection. It helps if they wash their face too, because kids touch their faces A LOT and impetigo is spread really easily among school-agers.

I really like the Vicks Vapor plugins for those stuffy nights. Seems to really help. ALso elevating the pillow a bit, I usually just fold a thin blanket under her pillow to just boost it a bit.
Lots of snuggles!!!!!

Great thread idea, especially for the cold season that is upon us. I will have to recall ask my wife what we give our kids to make them feel better. ;)

I just read an article about how drug makers recommend not giving children under the age of 4 cold and cough medicine. You can read the article here (http://www.clickondetroit.com/news/17643927/detail.html). What is everyone's thoughts on this information?

Johnson's has a Vapor Bath that I've even used. Making sure hands are clean are the most important thing.

Great thread idea, especially for the cold season that is upon us. I will have to recall ask my wife what we give our kids to make them feel better. ;)

I just read an article about how drug makers recommend not giving children under the age of 4 cold and cough medicine. You can read the article here (http://www.clickondetroit.com/news/17643927/detail.html). What is everyone's thoughts on this information?
Well personally I think there is a time and place for medications. Those meds do not help the problem go away, but if a child is sufferring and I mean really suffering can't sleep, eat, ect ect. then a small amount I would think is fine.

I have never had to give Nichole any cough or coldmeds so it hasn't come up luckily. She just had a cold a few weeks ago and we did the vapor and the vicks rub and she was fine in 2 or 3 days

I actually heard on the news last night that if your child is under four, not to give them medication for a cold... they have told us to wait it out! I give Hayden and Kylie tylenol when they have fevers... Thats really the only thing i ever use.

What I want to know is, why the sudden change? Why is this now a problem to give children under four cold and cough medicine? Granted we only used them when absolutely necessary and I don't agree that giving kids medicine is the first thing you should do. But, this goes back to how for years and years this was never a problem. I don't know if my parents gave me cough medicine when I was a toddler but if so it did no major harm. Maybe I missed something in the article above?

What I want to know is, why the sudden change? Why is this now a problem to give children under four cold and cough medicine? Granted we only used them when absolutely necessary and I don't agree that giving kids medicine is the first thing you should do. But, this goes back to how for years and years this was never a problem. I don't know if my parents gave me cough medicine when I was a toddler but if so it did no major harm. Maybe I missed something in the article above?
the way I understand it is that the tests on the medications where never preformed on the children's drug. They did the tests on the adult form and just added flavor, changed the doses, called it children's cold and cough, then put it on the shelf for people to buy

that is what I heard as well. They also say that many children's illnesses can seem like the common cold, so they don't want children with limited vocabulary (they don't know my child lol) to have their sickness covered up by stuff when it could be something more then a cold.

If I had a severe cough at night, I would call her doc and I am sure she would tell me to give the medication then. I wouldn't do it during the day though. I also would give Motrim and Tylonal for fever or headache kinda thing.

Glad to hear that I'm not the only one trying to make sense out of this!