Better babies and their care

by Anna Steese Richardson

Rickets is one of the most serious ailments which attack the young baby. It is not an acute but a chronic disease due to malnutrition. It overtakes the baby gradually, between six months and two years, and seems to strike chiefly at the bones. The first symptoms are fretfulness, sleeplessness, pallor, and sweating of the head. The child threatened with rickets wears off the hair at the back of the head, in its restlessness, and its pillow is always wet from perspiration. Gradually the abdomen becomes enlarged and out of proportion to the child’s other measurements. The teething is delayed, and the baby cannot sit up or walk as early as a normal child should. The little baby is usually constipated and suffers from general intestinal trouble. It is subject to colds, and it may have convulsions. If the condition is neglected the mother suddenly discovers that the child looks deformed. Some of the bones become enlarged; the chest is barrel-shaped; and when the baby begins to walk he is bow-legged because the bones are so soft.

If the child survives the illness it is often so deformed that it is marked for life. If the disease is discovered and treated promptly the child becomes strong and outgrows most of the defects.

Rickets is generally caused by improper feeding, by proprietary foods without the needed amount of fresh milk, or by fresh milk and foods that do not contain enough fat or cream. The prolonged use of boiled or sterilized milk, also, will cause rickets.

The cure lies with the diet, which should be changed immediately, under the direction of a physician, who will generally stop all proprietary, condensed, and boiled milk, and give whole milk, modified to suit the baby’s age. After the child has passed the first year the physician will order fresh eggs, beef juice, broths, and, possibly, cod-liver oil in emulsion. The little invalid must sleep in a well-aired room and be kept out of doors whenever the weather is pleasant.

Scurvy is another disease which can be traced to the use of proprietary foods without fresh milk, sterilized, pasteurized, or boiled milk, and it generally attacks a child between the seventh and tenth month. Among the symptoms are these:

Baby cries when handled; when the diaper is being changed; or, in severe cases, when any one touches the bed or bedding. The knee and ankle joints swell and are very tender, but they are not hot to the touch nor inflamed. The baby suffering from scurvy will generally lie on his back with the knees slightly drawn up and held far apart. If he has teeth the gums will swell and turn purple in color, or bleed easily. In some cases there is also bleeding from the nose and from the bowels. A physician should be called at once; but the real treatment is in the hands of the mother, who will give her baby fresh cow’s milk properly modified, and strained orange juice or thin apple-sauce once a day.

If the child has passed his first year when attacked by scurvy, he may have potatoes, mashed very fine and beaten light with milk, and other fresh vegetables, cooked very tender and pressed through a vegetable sieve. All this treatment must be given under the direction of the family physician.

There are certain ailments which no mother should neglect or attempt to treat. One of these is swollen glands behind and under the jaw and below the ear. These may be due to the presence of infectious diseases, to decayed teeth, enlarged tonsils, malnutrition, or marasmus. They may indicate tuberculosis. Sometimes the growth is gradual; sometimes they appear quite suddenly and disappear without making any great trouble. Occasionally they require incision to let out the pus. This is a simple operation, and recovery is almost always complete in a young child.

For retention of urine give the child a hot bath, raising the temperature from 100° to 105° F. If this does not have the desired effect put the child in bed and lay a compress over the region of the bladder. If the child is still unable to pass urine and there is inflammation of the parts, or a slight yellow discharge, a physician should be summoned.

Vaccination is still a mooted question among persons who argue that smallpox is now so rare that vaccination is unnecessary. This is a mistaken idea. Smallpox is rare because vaccination is commonly practiced. The healthy, normal baby should be vaccinated when he is about six months of age, and subsequently once in five years. If at any period between these dates he is exposed to the disease, he should be vaccinated immediately. Parents who object to compulsory vaccination in the schools can avoid this by having their children vaccinated at home by the family physician. If the latter is conscientious in selecting the vaccine, and the wound is kept clean until it is healed, there is absolutely no danger from infection of any kind. Occasionally one hears of a case where vaccination has been followed by some form of poisoning. This can almost invariably be traced to carelessness in the care of the wound, not to the quality of the vaccine used.