Episode Transcript
Speaker 1 00:00:06 Hello and welcome to a Wonder Care podcast, formally known as Wonder Baba podcast. I'm Sheena Mitchell, a pharmacist and mom of three. I combine healthcare and practical advice to support you on your parenting journey. I bring you this episode with the support of Salon Plus Breathe Z cell therapy device. This week I am talking all about hand, foot, and mouth disease. Isn't a childhood, just the gift that keeps on giving. I'm gonna be talking all about what causes it, the symptoms and complications, how it spreads. I'll be giving you some tips to help reduce the spread, how to treat it when you should see the doctor, and most importantly, a little piece of advice about the aftermath of hand, foot, and mouth disease that I was not aware of until I had my own kids to start us off hand. Foot amount disease is a viral infection and it's most commonly caused by the following viruses, cog sac virus, a 16, a six or a 10 or antivirus 71.
Speaker 1 00:01:15 It can affect any age group, but it's most common in children under 10 years of age. They're most likely to catch it in the summer are autumn. Obviously it's not foot and mouth disease, which is a viral infection which affects animals like cattle, sheep, and pigs. People always get a bit traumatized in the pharmacy when I think what their child is coming in in with is hand, foot and mouth disease. As soon as you say it, you have to kind of say, I don't mean the cow one <laugh>. The symptoms of hand, foot, and mouth disease can vary from child to child, but the most distinctive are those which give it its name, which are blisters on the hands, feet and mouth. The rash that comes with hand, foot and mouth, it appears like small red spots and they can have a little dark center and they can turn into blisters.
Speaker 1 00:02:06 They usually appear on the fingers, palms of hands, souls of feet, and the nappy area. But actually it can also appear on the arms and legs as certainly happened in my own household. The rash usually lasts up to about 10 days and it isn't usually itchy, which is good and different to chickenpox in that way. Another symptom is mouth ulcers. So after a couple of days of having the other symptoms, mouth ulcers can appear on the tongue, gums and inner cheek of your child. These can be small to start and then they increase into larger yellow or gray ulcers which have an outer red ring. Usually you'll end up with about five to 10 ulcers in the mouth area and they do normally persist for about five to seven days. They can can be really, really sore. They're one of the more problematic symptoms because it can stop your child from drinking and eating. Another thing to look out for is because your child is going to be finding it more painful to swallow, you might find that they're dribbling a little bit more than normal and that's why. So other than the characteristic traits of the blisters in the hands, feet and mouth, you can also get a high temperature. Other symptoms include a cough, a sore throat, a lack of appetite, and sometimes they get a pain in their tummy and even have vomiting. So basically you're looking at flu-like symptoms with the addition of the horrible blisters.
Speaker 1 00:03:44 How is it spread? Hand, foot and neck disease can be spread in several ways and it is quite contagious. The little infected droplets can be carried by coughs and sneezes. So just like every other illness, it's quite hard to reduce the spread amongst children because they spend so much time very close together, they have no boundaries. <laugh> the fluid in the blisters and in their saliva also carries their infection. So contact between kids can result in the illness spreading. We all know toddlers love kissing and hugging and unfortunately that's why they're more likely to catch it. It is worth noting that stools. So poo can also contain the virus, and this is why sometimes it spreads quite easily in a crash setting because there's an awful lot of nappy changing going on. The best ways to help reduce the spread of hand, foot and mouth disease is to keep your child away from ER school while they're not feeling well.
Speaker 1 00:04:42 Make sure there's no sharing of things like utensils and cups and do throw on a hot wash for all bedding and clothing that has come in contact with any saliva or blisters. It's really, really important and we're all very good at it now, but hand hygiene. So everyone in the household should be wash, wash, washing in those hands thoroughly and regularly. And remember, antibacterial hand gel won't always do it for viruses, so you do need soap and water. Ensure your kids are using good sneeze etiquette and even for coughing. So you know, remind them to catch it, kill it. Bennett, dispose of all tissues properly in the bin when they're finished with rather than just throwing them on the couch like my kids like to, you're like, lovely. Thanks for that. Try to prevent your child from bursting, blisters or any adults in your house who may be tempted. The fluid inside them is infectious
Speaker 1 00:05:38 In terms of treatment, hand, foot and mac disease is one of those things like chickenpox or many other viral illnesses that there's no specific treatment to cure the disease. It will go away by itself and that usually takes seven to 10 days. However, that does not mean that you, you have to let your child suffer in silence. You can absolutely treat their symptoms and I'm gonna give you some ways to do that now. First things first, you can use paracetamol or ibuprofen when they need it. So if they have any pain or any fever, that's when you're going to use those types of medications. Do encourage your child to drink plenty of liquids. If they keep sipping on cold fluids, that'll help to reduce the pain in their mouth. It's also really important that they keep drinking to prevent dehydration. Milk and water are absolutely fine.
Speaker 1 00:06:31 Just avoid things that are particularly acidic like fruit juice. They definitely recommend treating your child to a little ice pop. Something like that can really help to cheer them up and reduce the pain in their mouth. It also does help to keep them hydrated so it's the one time that the unhealthy treat and be medically recommended. One of my favorite products for reducing pain in the mouth of children through blisters, whether it be little ulcers or even sometimes kids get chickenpox in the mouth, but particularly for hand, foot and mouth disease because you do get kind of five to 10 blisters in your mouth commonly with this disease. Diff lamp spray is definitely worth having to hand. The dose is one puff per four kilos in weight for children under six. So I don't really recommend spraying it directly into their mouth unless they're kind of three or four and they're willing to let you do it. Otherwise, I would just spray one spray onto clean fingers and wipe it around where this orb blisters are. It's a good idea to use this before you're trying to get your child to drink or eat so that their pain is reduced and they're more likely to feel like having a little something.
Speaker 1 00:07:44 When do you need to see the doctor? It's a good idea to see the doctor. If you suspect hand foot mac disease and your child is under six months of age, you can usually treat it at home other than that, but it is important to say that if your child is in an awful lot of pain and unable to swallow, you do need to keep an eye for signs of dehydration if you suspect dehydration do see the doctor. So signs of dehydration are infrequent urination. So in kids with nappies, that would be a dry nappy for more than 12 hours if they're not drinking at least half of their normal fluid volume if they're crying, but there's no tears, if they become drowsy, lethargic, tired, they're really not responding to you in a way that they normally would In babies, you're checking for sunken fentanyl.
Speaker 1 00:08:31 So that's the soft spot on the top of their head and in general, you're just using your gut instinct. Another thing to say, and I always like to mention it when I'm talking about any kind of rash, do try and differentiate between hand foot mac disease and meningitis. So meningitis doesn't really get the fluid filled blisters like this wood. So if the spots are just red in certain areas and they're not disappearing under a glass, so they're failing the blanche test and your child isn't well and getting worse, then you need to seek urgent medical attention. If you're happy that it is hand, foot and mouth disease, then the symptoms should just resolve within seven to 10 days. So just continue to treat the symptoms until they're gone. Children with hand, foot and mouth disease are contagious from a couple of days before they get symptoms and while they're unwell, they will remain contagious until all of the blisters have completely dried out.
Speaker 1 00:09:29 Problem with hand, foot and mouth disease is that it can remain infectious in the stools for several weeks after infection. And so in a childcare setting, it's really important that the carers are aware of who has had hand, foot and mouth disease and who hasn't so that they can make sure that all hygiene measures are being really, really vigilantly kept as I'm sure they are anyway, just to ensure that it doesn't spread further around the crash. So why do I always like to talk about the aftermath hand, foot and mouth disease? I suppose I want to highlight a common problem that occurs after the illness. One of my daughters had quite a bad case of hand, foot and mouth disease, and so she had significant damage to her nail bed, so the nails on her fingers and toes because the blisters formed on the skin under her nails.
Speaker 1 00:10:21 Unfortunately, after she was fully recovered from the virus, it continued to haunt her. The nails can basically slowly peel off and come away from the skin. This is known as only com Desis to care for nails that are peeling off after an infection with hand foot and mouth disease. It is really important not to pick at them at all and not to let your child pick at them because it's very easy for a little cush to happen, which would leave your child open to infection. Use a little nail clippers to just clip off the excess nail and then use a plaster to cover it if you can, if it's catching on things during the day. It's just a really good idea to know that this can happen after hand, foot and mouth, especially if it's kind of cold weather outside and you're wondering why your child is kicking up such a fuss when you're trying to get loves on them. It could just be that little parts of nails are coming off and getting stuck in material. So do watch out for that and don't worry, they will absolutely return to normal after that has happened and that process is finished and they will still have a future of beautiful manicures in front of them. <laugh>,
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Speaker 1 00:12:04 Listeners questions. So a lot of it I have covered throughout the episode. One person just gotten there to ask how long you should keep your child home from school and really, once they're feeling better and all of the blisters are dried up, which would normally take about 10 days, then they're absolutely fine to return to school. Another question is, can you get hand button out disease more than once? And unfortunately, yes, because there are different viruses that cause the disease, it is possible to get it more than once, but comforting to know that it's not normally as severe as the second time round. Someone else is asking, can adults catch hand foot Mac disease from their kids? And potentially yes they could is the answer, but they are likely to have built immunity over the years and are more likely to remain asymptomatic. Someone else is asking how long it takes for hand, foot and mouth to show up in someone who's been hanging out with someone else who has since come down with hand, foot and mouth.
Speaker 1 00:13:07 And generally it's about three to five days from exposure. Okay, I think that pretty much answers all of the questions. There was a few that were kind of duplicated, so I hope that I've answered everyone's there. And remember, next week I will be talking all about conjunctivitis and I'd be delighted to get any questions through our podcast WhatsApp number, which is oh 8 6 0 3 5 3 4 6 2. So you can pop messages in there or voice notes, whatever you like. And you can also pop your questions into my stories on Instagram. Keep an eye for the question boxes because I do try to keep them up for a few days, usually the weekend before the podcast goes live. Thank you so, so much to everyone for listening. And for those of you who have school going kids, I hope that midterm is going well and that everyone is healthy and happy and that the parents are not too stressed out with having everyone home. <laugh>, I'll talk to you next week. Bye.
