Fever and Taking Your Child’s Temperature

Most parents have experienced this scenario: You wake up in the middle of the night to find your child standing by your bed, flushed, hot, and sweaty. Your little one’s forehead feels warm. You immediately suspect a fever, but are unsure of what to do next. Should you get out the thermometer? Call the doctor?

In healthy kids, fevers usually don’t indicate anything serious. Although it can be frightening when your child’s temperature rises, fever itself causes no harm and can actually be a good thing — it’s often the body’s way of fighting off infections. And not all fevers need to be treated. High fever, however, can make a child uncomfortable and aggravate problems such as dehydration.

What Is Fever?
Fever occurs when the body’s internal ‘thermostat’ raises the body temperature above its normal level - usually around 98.6° Fahrenheit, or about 37° Celsius.

Most people’s body temperatures even change a little bit during the course of the day: It’s usually a little lower in the morning and a little higher in the evening and can fluctuate as kids run around, play, and exercise.

Sometimes, though, the hypothalamus will ‘reset’ the body to a higher temperature in response to an infection, illness, or some other cause. Researchers believe turning up the heat is the body’s way of fighting the germs that cause infections and making the body a less comfortable place for them.

What Causes Fever?
It’s important to remember that fever by itself is not an illness — it’s usually a symptom of an underlying problem. Fever has several potential causes:

Infection: Most fevers are caused by infection or other illness. Fever helps the body fight infections by stimulating natural defense mechanisms.

Overdressing: Infants, especially newborns, may get fevers if they’re overbundled or in a hot environment because they don’t regulate their body temperature as well as older children. However, because fevers in newborns can indicate a serious infection, even infants who are overdressed must be evaluated by a doctor if they have a fever.

Immunisations: Babies and children sometimes get a low-grade fever after getting vaccinated.

Although teething may cause a slight rise in body temperature, it’s probably not the cause if a child’s temperature is higher than 100° Fahrenheit (37.8° Celsius).

When Can a Fever Be a Sign of Something Serious?
Kids whose temperatures are lower than 102° Fahrenheit (38.9° Celsius) often don’t require medication unless they’re uncomfortable. However, if you have an infant 3 months or younger, you should call your doctor immediately. Even a slight fever can be a sign of a potentially serious infection in very young infants.

For children over three, take behaviour and activity level into account. Watching how your child behaves will give you a pretty good idea whether a minor illness is the cause or if your child should be seen by a doctor.

The illness is probably not serious if your child:

• is still interested in playing
• is eating and drinking well
• is alert and smiling at you
• has a normal skin colour
• looks well when his or her temperature comes down

And don’t worry too much about a child with a fever who doesn’t want to eat. This is very common with infections that cause fever. For kids who still drink and urinate normally, not eating as much as usual is OK.

In some children fever can cause febrile convulsions and if this happens you need to seek medical attention immediately and try to get the child’s temperature down as quickly as possible.

Taking your child’s temperature
There are lots of different thermometers on the market but for smaller children using a digital ear thermometer is probably the best way of getting an accurate reading.

You should also remember not to take a child’s temperature right after a bath or if the child has been bundled up tightly for a while as this will affect the reading.

(Back to children's health)