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Parents
give Kids useless, risky drugs
By Tim Friend
USA TODAY 10/5/94
Parents often
give over-the-counter drugs to preschool children to treat colds,
despite the potential for harm and little proof that the drugs are
effective.
A survey of
8,145 mothers of 3-year olds found 53.7% of the kids had been
given an OTC drug in the previous 30 days, mostly cold medicine
and Tylenol, says Michael Kogan of the National Center for Health
Statistics. In today's Journal of the American Medical
Association:
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70% of children
with a recent illness got OTC drugs
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Half of kids
had been given two types of drugs
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White, married,
educated mothers with good incomes were most likely to give
drugs
FDA's Dr. Michael
Weintraub says side effects are generally not serious, but there
is potential for adverse reactions and over sedation.
Parents feel the
need to do something for a sick child and in the process
"become easy prey to......promotion by drug companies'"
says Dr. Anne Gadomski of the University of Maryland, in an
editorial in the same issue.
From 1985-89,
670,000 reports were made to poison control centers involving
over-the-counter drugs and children under age 6.
The truth, she
says, is preschool kids experience 4 to 8 upper respiratory tract
infections a year that are caused by viruses, and there is no cure
for these infections. They commonly go away by themselves in 5 to
7 days.
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