La Grippe is a highly contagious disease. It prevails epidemically, and after an active epidemic it may remain in the vicinity for a number of years. It is more frequently seen in the late winter months and early spring. The poison of the disease clings to clothing and apartments as well as to railroad and street cars. The germ is found in the sputum and in the nasal secretions.
Sneezing is one of its symptoms and it is one of the ways by which the disease is spread around. Children should never be brought near an adult suffering from influenza. One attack does not render the patient immune to a subsequent attack as is the case with most of the contagious diseases. The reverse is the rule with La Grippe because one attack favors the development of another attack. It is a common experience for many people to have influenza every winter or spring.
Symptoms.—If a child "catches" grippe, it becomes quite sick abruptly. There is usually chilliness, pains in the muscles all over the body, more or less fever, sometimes nausea and vomiting. If the attack is a more severe one, the prostration is more marked, the temperature higher and the signs of shock and poisoning of the system are more in evidence. A child a few months old can get influenza so severely as to cause collapse and death in thirty-six hours. As a rule the type of grippe most common in infancy is of a very mild character. It lasts about a week. Children may be a little slow in convalescing and it may be three or four weeks before they regain their health.
Complications.—As has been intimated, the most frequent complication is bronchitis and the most fatal one is broncho-pneumonia.
A congestion of the entire mucous membrane of the respiratory tract, producing a nasal discharge, a sore and inflamed throat, pains and a feeling of compression, with a cough in the chest, may accompany the disease.
Gastric symptoms, with vomiting, intestinal disturbance, diarrhea, with or without mucus and blood, are quite common in some epidemics.
Not infrequently we have numerous cases in which the ear seems to be the vulnerable part. As a consequence running ears have to receive most of our attention. When the ears are affected, the glands of the neck become inflamed. They swell up and add considerable to the discomfort of the little patient.
Treatment.—Cases of influenza should be isolated. Children should be put in a room by themselves and the other children of the family should not be permitted to see them. The rooms should be disinfected after the case is over. As complications are the dangerous element in grippe, we should try to prevent them. This can be best done by promptly putting the child in bed, making him comfortable, opening his bowels by castor oil or calomel. He should be made to drink hot lemonade. He should be kept on a light diet from which meat and vegetables are excluded.
The above treatment will usually suffice in the ordinary uncomplicated grippe. If complications arise they must be treated according to the conditions.
It is well to remember that the degree of prostration following a rather severe attack of grippe is out of all proportion to the extent of the disease. These little patients sometimes suffer considerably and do not regain their strength promptly. Experience has taught us that the best thing to do is to send them away. A change of climate will do wonders for them, more quickly and more thoroughly than all the medicine we can give them at home. The seashore is particularly good for them.