Tuesday, February 10, 2009

You Just Love Me for My Infant Tylenol

So a few months ago, I wrote a post titled "Infant Tylenol and the Mystery Dose" about the frustrations that parents feel about trying to find the right dosing for infant tylenol.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/171/382350706_95a3f8865e.jpg?v=0I mean really, how silly is it to sell INFANT Tylenol and then in the instructions put "for under 2, consult your doctor." Well then why not just make it a prescription drug?

Anyway, apparently there are a lot of people out there who feel me, because that has consistently been one of my most visited posts, and if you do a Google search for "infant tylenol dose," my post is number 6 on the results page. Of course now that I am posting about it again, I'll probably get even more visits (kinda like what Epi went through when she noted that she was getting visitors who were looking for "best boob blog" and then started getting tons more. Seriously, she is now number 8 on the results page, though I don't recommend looking for that particular string of words while you are on the work computer.) Oh, and hello to all the new people who are visiting my blog trying to find the best boobs. To you I say "Hello. I'm Braden. You will be here for about 15 seconds while you determine that I do not, in fact, have any pictures of boobs, and while yes, my boobs have started to jiggle a bit as I run down the stairs, that is not necessarily such a good thing on a hairy-chested guy. Please take your hormones and go elsewhere. Thank you." (Did you notice how I used AIDET to accomplish that? My patient satisfaction scores should go through the roof on that one.)

Okay, I got distracted. And now I'm not even sure what my original point was. That's what I get for trying to blog at 1 AM while the T3 kicks in. I think I need to stop before I start giving out my credit card PIN number. I can't have anybody find out that it is 12345, because that is the kind of combination an idiot would have on his luggage.

Oh yeah, where I was before the ADOBSO kicked in: please, peeps, just put a good dosing chart on the box of infant Tylenol, because what's going to happen is the parents are going to come to us, and we are just going to give them a dosing chart and charge them 90 bucks.

Dear parents: if your kid is just a little fussy or has a little fever, then it is 10 milligrams per kilogram. If they need more pain relief or fever reduction, you can go to 15 milligrams per kilogram. If you are really worried, or they are really hurt, then get them in to be evaluated by a doctor (I said that for the lawyers). You can convert your child's weight in pounds down to kilograms by dividing by 2.2, or use an online conversion calculator.

So if your child weighs 22 pounds, then they are 10 kilograms, and therefore the dose range is 100-150 mg (10x10 and 10x15).

If your child is 14 pounds, then they are 6.5 kilograms, and therefore the dose range is 65-100 mg (6.5x10 and 6.5x15). You will note that I rounded a little. This is okay because among all the measuring devices ever invented by man, there are none that surpass the infant tylenol dropper for sheer inexactitudeosityessnous. Trust me, you are going to have a hard enough time trying to get 100 mg, let's just forget the idea of being able to figure out 97.5 (or more exactly 95.45, since I rounded the weight a little, too).

disclaimer: blah blah blah not a doctor blah blah blah don't take medical advice from me blah blah blah your lawyer doesn't know where I live anyway blah blah blah if your child is sick enough that a dose of Tylenol is the making or breaking point, and yet you are still searching for advice from a random nurse's blog then you probably should be letting Grandma and Grandpa take care of the kiddos from now on.

Image stolen borrowed from somedood on flickr. Found via Google Image Search. All rights reserved and all that jive, yo.

4 comments:

annahannah said...

Seriously. One time when I visited a pediatrician (so you KNOW it was a long time ago.), I saw the charts in the little boxes of info. I took one home and used my judgment. If the kid was really sick, I went to the doctor. If he just had a short term bug (or got vaccinations), I gave him tylenol. Infant. Cause grinding up those tablets and getting them down an infant was too hard. jk

Epijunky said...

Don't ever title a post "Best Boob Blog". It's just asking for trouble. Just saying.

As far as the infant tylenol dosing... Good God. I couldn't agree more.

Humincat said...

As a mother of a 25 month old who weighs 22 lbs, THANKS!

Anonymous said...

Love you! I may never see this blog again, but you answered my question *and* made me laugh! Thanks.