Post by dulcemariamar on Sept 28, 2015 9:02:21 GMT -5
I hate having to decide when to go and I took my DD to urgent care today and the pedi made me feel that I was silly to bring her in.
My DD has croup. I put her down for a nap. I hear a bit of a strange noise and check the video monitor and I see her standing up in the crib. She is having trouble breathing and can not catch her breath. So I bring her outside in the cold air and for over 5 minutes she sounding like she is choking and has a bit of a cough that sounds like she is barking. Since she is not improvingI decide to head to the nearest clinic that is only two streets over. I put her in the stroller and she is unresponsive for a few minutes. She starts to breathe better when we get there but is still pretty out of it. The doctor checks her over and tells that it is normal and will happen a lot and that it is not necessary to bring her because of what happened.
Did I overreact? Or is the pedi horrible? This is our first case of croup and breathing issues freak me out.
(There is no type of nurses line here so you just have to decide what to do)
Post by jeaniebueller on Sept 28, 2015 9:05:14 GMT -5
That pedi is horrible. You did not overreact. I would have done the same thing. You should always bring them in if you suspect that they cannot breathe. FWIW, I had an ER doctor act like I was over the top bringing DD in and then they missed that she had pneumonia (her ped ordered the X ray in an appointment following the ER visit), so I really could not care less if medical staff thinks I am ridiculous. Did they give her a steroid treatment?
What? My husband went to the Urgent Care last week when HE couldn't breathe well. Breathing is sort of the only thing we need to do unless we die immediately. You did the right thing.
DS1 has asthma and I have taken him in when I didn't need to a few times when he's been sick. Now that he's older (4.5) I feel a lot more confident in knowing when it's truly an emergency and when it just sounds bad. We also have a neb and albuterol to try first at home, which usually helps him. I don't think it's bad to go in but I also look back on a few times when we rushed him to urgent care and in hindsight he was fine. Now it takes a true breathing emergency like his lips turning blue or the albuterol not helping for us to take him in. We also don't mess with urgent care. If he's having an attack we go to the children's hospital ER and I text his respitory doc.
I think that doc is ridiculous. And my response would have been, "So you're telling me that when my child is struggling for air and becomes nonresponsive, I should not seek medical attention?"
Yeah you absolutely did the right thing. If your child can't breathe, go in. If your child is unresponsive, go in. If you child can't breathe AND is unresponsive absolutely go in. Screw that Dr.
I would of brought her in. I would not return that Pedi. What a wench. My pedi would rather us take her in if we don't things are improving then wait it out.
What? No. Eff your pedi for making you feel bad about that. You absolutely did the right thing going in. I wouldn't blame you for going to urgent care OR the er.
Your pedi was right but he/she obviously could've explained things better since the urgent care doctor also told you not to worry about it.
However I am not really an urgent care kind of person for DD. If I suspect a problem, I'm either calling the pedi or heading to the ER. For myself I'll go to urgent care because I havn't established a regular physician yet.
Post by undecidedowl on Sept 28, 2015 9:24:17 GMT -5
What do you mean by unresponsive? Because to me, that is like call 911 and check to see if CPR is needed territory. I know it's hard for docs to assess patients once they are looking better but they still need to take the parents descriptions seriously.
Next time, you can always head straight to urgent care/ER or whatever, then decide before you check in if she is looking better maybe it's not needed but at least you would be there just in case.
Uncontrolled bleeding, lethargy, and airway/breathing issues=no hesitation.
That doctor's behavior and decisions are appalling. I'm sorry.
I do often have to decide between local urgent care or driving an hour for our pediatrician. I'll usually call the urgent care to see who the doc is and then make a decision. #smalltownliving
Uncontrolled bleeding, lethargy, and airway/breathing issues=no hesitation.
That doctor's behavior and decisions are appalling. I'm sorry.
I do often have to decide between local urgent care or driving an hour for our pediatrician. I'll usually call the urgent care to see who the doc is and then make a decision. #smalltownliving
Do you have a nebulizer?
We do not have a nebulizer. They gave us steroid suppositories but they are not fast acting. More like 20-30 minutes.
Uncontrolled bleeding, lethargy, and airway/breathing issues=no hesitation.
That doctor's behavior and decisions are appalling. I'm sorry.
I do often have to decide between local urgent care or driving an hour for our pediatrician. I'll usually call the urgent care to see who the doc is and then make a decision. #smalltownliving
Do you have a nebulizer?
We do not have a nebulizer. They gave us steroid suppositories but they are not fast acting. More like 20-30 minutes.
I have been lucky enough that typically my kids have really only needed it during the day when our pedis sick clinic is open.
For me I feel like the few times I have gone to urgent care the Dr has said something to make me feel like they thought the visit wasn't necessary. Whatever. Better to be cautious and trust your instincts
The doctor sounds stupid to me. Breathing issues are nothing to mess around with. My son had croup many times and was given steroids which helped tremendously. Did you at least get a script for that? Croup can be dangerous if that extreme.
Also, with urgent care, I say, better safe than sorry. I did take my older son there for breathing trouble like you describe. He ended up needing treatments and was hospitalized for 2 days (influenza).
I would have gone too and I am not one to run to urgent care. At all. Sometimes to a fault.
Croup is scary. I've never gone to the dr. for it but only because my MIL has tons of experience and medical background so I trust her advice. If I didn't, I'd go too. DD has a tendency towards croup (even at 4 FFS) and it's a terrible sound.
It is rectodelt. Do they give that for croup in the States?
No.
We usually do albuterol using a nebulizer. Sometimes we'll do a one-time steroid injection, depending on severity. DS1 has had both. ETA: Although he hasn't had actual croup, just RSV and/or pneumonia.
DS2 has had croup and we did the nebulizer since we already had it.
To answer the question though, no, I don't really find it hard to know when to go to urgent care or not. I haven't actually taken any child to urgent care in over 6 years. I have actually only taken kids to urgent care three times. Once for a breathing issue that hospitalized by oldest for a week, once for a freak out that was totally unwarranted with my second about her breathing, and once because my oldest had a temperature of 105 with a terrible viral rash.