How do you get medicine into a child who simply refuses to take medicine?
ds2 is 2.5 years old. i simply cannot get medicine into him. i try holding him down and syringing it into his mouth but he refuses to swallow and spits it all back out. it is quite distressing for both of us.
my LO spits out panadol and a some others. she likes brauers stuff. and i found another one (for pain/fever) that she will take.
can you get an alternative? is it a long term thing? if it was needed and short term, i would go the wrestle, squirt and hope some goes down. if it's needed and long term, can you try bribery or disguising it in food/drink?
We have no luck with syringes at all - but the spoon works well. And the post-medicine chocolate bribe too.
If it is gluggy medicine then adding a little water may help too.
A lot of this is about control - your little one probably resents being forced to do something, especially something yucky. Try putting the medicine on a very big spoon on the table, and putting the treat next to it and telling him that when he has swallowed all the medicine he can have the treat. And agree with him that its yucky - we call DS's antibiotics "horribus medicine" because that's what he christened it.
I had a similar problem with my DS and teeth cleaning. I used to have to swaddle him in a blanket and sit on him to clean his teeth. But now he is big enough to "do it himself" he does it, and then I just do a quick clean afterwards - no major fights any more.
my DD1 got easier when she was about 4 yrs old, but before that age it was very difficult - pinning her down was the only way and persisting. When she got older, she learnt it was over quickly and yes, we used treats afterwards. Good luck.
Have you seen the tommee tippee (I think) product they is a medicine thingy.
I will PM you the link.. Ds2 used to have a lot of medication when he was a newborn and this worked great and we continued buying it for panadol ect. We don't need them anymore though..
oh man i am in this boat right now with my 1 year old!!
she hates the stuff (dont blame her lol). but her fever is too high for comfort and I want to help bring it down for a few hours relief for her but she just spits it all out again....so distressing, i hear you on that one G xx
We have at times (when the medicine has been yucky tasting) force the kids to take it. DH will hold them down so they cann't move, I will force the syring in their mouth. Now the have to be laying on their back for this, and you have to dribble it out of the syringe slowly so there isn't enough at anyone time to spit it out from that position - you also need to make sure that the syringe stays between their teeth the whole time (if they can close their teeth or their mouth, they will still be able to spit it out, even the small quantities). It can be a slow torturous process, but sometimes you just don't have any other choice. Also be prepared for some spluttering, but provided you only put very small squirts in at a time, they shouldn't choke.
My younger DS used to projectile vomit ANY medicine that I tried to give him, including pred which he HAD to have for his asthma.
So on the advice of his doctors, and the chemist, from about the age of 18 months (when he was the size of a three year old) he has had tablets, usually half the adult dose (in accordance with the recommendations of the dr/chemist), in a teaspoon of AktaVite/Milo. Raw. It's all chocolatey which hides the taste, and he won't spit it out.
Check with your dr/chemist if there is some tablet or other method. Otherwise there's always suppositories...
We mix medicines with a bit of water or milk in a cup and give him a straw, he gulps it all down, worst case we add a dash of cordial to the water or a small amount of Milo to the milk, but make sure he sees us add it and make a big deal of it like 'Oooo, yummy!' etc and there's never a drama.. He doesn't mind the taste of the nurofen and will suck that out of the syringe himself but all others we have to mix..
thanks for the suggestions. i don't think theres any easy solution with this kid. he is extremely strong willed and defiant. explaining it to him would no nothing. he does not go for bribes. the spoon thing would never work with him...
i also don't understand how you are supposed to get 9ml of panadol into them on a spoon? seems like an awful lot to me.
arrrg, idk....i really don't know what to do anymore.
ginger, it sounds like my DS is very similar to yours. i've tried mixing things in drinks/yoghurt/food & somehow he can just sense it. even if i've gone to great pains to hide it while he's nowhere near.
unfortunately we've mostly resorted to the holding him down & i hope that as he gets older, he'll understand the concept of a treat afterwards. i have also used the baby panadol as well as it's a far smaller dose. the chemist told me there wasn't a huge difference, esp not at that age, more just one is a bigger amount for them to take. no idea if that's completely accurate though.
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How do you get medicine into a child who simply refuses to take medicine?
to you both, no advice here but i hope J man is better asap xx
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