Dysentery disease refers to acute intestinal infections, it is caused by varieties of shigella dysentery rod that penetrate the human body. Yet this infectious disease is called a disease of dirty hands, because in most cases the pathogen enters the body with food that has been in unwashed hands. To recognize this disease in a child and take appropriate measures, you need to know how dysentery manifests.
Common symptoms of dysentery
Dysentery in children provokes the following symptoms: fever, chills, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain, lethargy, decreased appetite. After the incubation period (usually several days, but sometimes several hours), an acute manifestation of the disease begins. The temperature in dysentery can rise to 38-39 ° C, and in severe forms and higher. The chair becomes more frequent in dysentery, at first the body displays abundant fecal masses, then the volumes decrease, and the usual color is replaced by a greenish color with an admixture of mucus, sometimes blood. The greatest danger of this stool is in dehydration . If the above signs of dysentery in children are accompanied by dry mucous membranes and a whitish coating on the tongue, it is necessary to urgently fill the loss of fluid with water-salt solutions. Of course, the disease can be of an individual nature and proceed in different ways depending on the child's age, immunity, complications of concurrent diseases, etc.
The severity of dysentery - symptomatology
The mild course of the disease manifests itself in a low temperature (up to 37-38 ° C), vomiting only on the first day, sometimes with no abdominal pain, frequent stools with mucus up to 7 times a day. Appetite may not be disturbed. Usually the child is restored within a week completely. The danger of an easy form is that, with minimal suffering of the child, others suffer. In this state the child often finds himself in a team where he spreads the infection. Therefore, any diarrhea and vomiting should cause a temporary refusal to visit the school or kindergarten.
The average severity of dysentery carries a more pronounced nature of intoxication. Vomiting can last for several days, the child is tormented by painful tenesmus (false urge to defecate), the temperature rises already up to 39 ° C. The color of the stool with moderate dysentery is noticeably green, accompanied by the release of a large volume of mucus and a small amount of blood, repeated up to 15 times a day. Recovery comes after two weeks.
The severe form of dysentery is characterized by a sharp temperature jump above 39 ° C. Acute dysentery in children is accompanied by incessant vomiting, severe pain, a very frequent stool, which quickly ceases to contain feces, and is a mucus with blood. This condition requires an urgent call to the doctor.
Season diseases and risk groups
The peak incidence of dysentery falls on July-August, at risk are children from 2 to 7 years. This is explained by the fact that in the summer months the child spends a lot of time on the street with dirty hands and often eats unwashed fruits. Children do not concern this statistics for a year, they are much less likely to have dysentery, since breastfeeding gives the child protection from infections. Rare cases of the disease can be provoked by poor-quality water or sour-milk products. Symptoms of dysentery in infants can manifest more slowly, gain strength for several days. Feces usually do not change much, mucus is added, very rarely blood. Such flaccid symptomatology allows you to make an accurate diagnosis only after clinical tests.