Diphtheria is an acute infectious disease characterized by an inflammatory process in the upper respiratory tract (zev, larynx, nose), in places of cuts and abrasions on the skin. Unfortunately, no one has immunity from diphtheria. Infecting can be airborne from already infected, from carriers of bacteria or from contaminated objects. The duration of the incubation period is from 2 to 5 days. The danger to the child is the complications caused by diphtheria, caused by a large amount of toxin in the infectious focus. Getting into the blood, toxic substances are spread throughout the body of the crumbs, affecting the cells of the kidneys, the nervous system and the heart. Diphtheria of the larynx often leads to true croup. The breathing hole is reduced, and the baby lacks oxygen. And then the most terrible of consequences of diphtheria - a lethal outcome can come.
Diphtheria in children: treatment
If suspected diphtheria of a sick child is immediately hospitalized in the infectious disease department. The disease is confirmed clinically, that is, taking a smear from the nose and throat. The main method of treating diphtheria in children is the administration of antitoxic antidiphtheria serum in the first two days of the disease. The purpose of antibiotics has the function of suppressing further spread of the infection, and the effect of the disease does not extend to the course of the disease. Isolation in a diphtheria-born child discontinues after all symptoms and two negative tests for bacterial carriage disappear.
Prevention of diphtheria
The main way to prevent a dangerous infection is vaccination against diphtheria in the DTP complex (whooping cough + diphtheria + tetanus).
Vaccination in children up to a year: in three months, then in 45 days and last in half a year. The free vaccine is difficult to tolerate - the temperature rises, the moody behavior of the child is noted, the place of the injection becomes painful and hardens. It is possible to vaccinate against diphtheria in paid rooms, in which foreign analogues of DTP are introduced with relatively easy
"Where do they put the vaccine against diphtheria for children up to a year?" - This question worries many mothers. Infants are given the vaccine in the thigh for better absorption by the body.
Revaccination of diphtheria occurs one year from the date of the last vaccination procedure. Subsequent vaccination is carried out at 6-7 years, 11-12 years and 16-17 years.
Such preventive measures not only reduce the percentage of childhood morbidity diphtheria. Even if the child has this illness, as a result of repeated injection of the vaccine against diphtheria, the consequences of the disease are not so serious, since it proceeds in a lighter form.