A Mommy Blog About Raising Men, Not Boys.
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Monday, March 30, 2009

Just What IS This Scarlet Fever?I Thought No One Got It Anymore

Well since my kids were diagnosed with SCARLET FEVER last week in the ER I've had
  • A Complete moment of terror
  • My Mind relieved
  • To listen to every story of someone's relative who died/baby died/went deaf/went blind/became mentally disabled etc

...because of scarlet fever.

And I've LEARNED a lot - which I think is stuff you need to know.

First off, scarlet fever is alive and well. It never went anywhere it's not like small pox.

Scarlet fever and scarlatina are the same thing. Don't ask your MOM, look it up.

The CDC does a nice job of just running down the info you need or you can google it, but here is the short version.

Scarlet fever is a really really bad strain of strep. Yes it used to kill people and do other things,but now they just give you a shot of penicillin and in 48 hours you're back to your old tantrum throwing self. (We began to wonder if one of ours actually had MISS Scarlet Fever because his tantrums increased).

If your kids run a high fever and then break out in spots, you need to be seen. Because it's treatable, but it's still the same old disease that can do very bad things to good people.

So, here we are. It's three days later and everyone is getting better.

But thank you all very much for your good thoughts. It was much appreciated

5 comments:

Roslin said...

I had it when I was 7. I remember feeling awful but I survived, no damage (that I know of ;-)) I think the important thing is catching it and treating it in time.

Unknown said...

Ouch. Regular strep is bad enough! That parades around our house like Macy's at Thanksgiving.

So "scarlet fever" = "Super strep". Interesting. Not nice, but interesting.

Anonymous said...

huh. i never really knew what Scarlet fever was. now i know. You always pull through the most interesting of situations, dear. Like you're superwoman with super kids. yup.

Chilli said...

My kids had scarlett fever when they were 3 and 2 years old. we diddn't know it at the time but scarlett fever is a scary sickness and left both my kids with lasting damage to their hearing and their teeth ( the enamel on their teeth was destroyed by the high fever).

Be advised that this is still a very serius bacteriaal virus to be looked after properly. My kids were on antibiotics but both still partially deaf.

Annette said...

My mother had scarlet fever at around age 12. Her teeth have been terrible ever since. Her Uncle was her dentist and could not figure out why her teeth were (are) so bad when she took such excellent care of them. Then (58 years later) she learned that scarlet fever can destroy the enamel of the teeth!