Java for Junior?

Does your child drink caffeine?  How young is too young to drink "the fuel?"  As an ingredient to many children's favorites from sodas to candy to ice cream, as well as many over-the-counter pain and cold medications, it behooves parents to know just how caffeine may affect your child.

According to the Nemours Foundation--a pediatric health system and research group--here are some of the ways caffeine affects a child's body:  Can cause

• nervous and jittery feelings
• an upset stomach.
• headaches.
• trouble concentrating and sleeping.
• a spike in heart rate and blood pressure

Madness, to me, is the thought of parents giving their children full-on coffee drinks as beverages.  But hey, who am I to judge?  If it's no problem for you to handle a screaming, caffeine-amped maniac, then more power to ya.

Even worse, though, is the number of parents feeding their children liquid sugar.  If that isn't enough caffeine and sugar to whack them out physically and mentally, then throw in some Cap'n Crunch.  Be my guest...it's your kid.  My girls won't get caffeine before high school if we can help it, and maybe even college if it's entirely up to me.

But it's a tough one with caffeine and sugar permeating most popular kids' drinks.  In any case, if you are allowing your child to drink soda and coffee beverages to their juvenile hearts' content, then don't be surprised when they're put on the Ritalin at school--it's a natural progression.

Robotripping

Ever been robotripping?  Know a teen that has?  If so, slap 'em across the head for me, "Hey stupid! Wake the hell up!"  Robotripping sends thousands of kids to the hospital every year.

Robotripping is drinking large amounts of cold medicine, more than 25 times the recommended dose.  It's a way for teens to alter their state of consciousness.  The active ingredient robotrippers jones for is dextromethorphan, found in more than 100 over-the-counter medications, including Robitussin and NyQuil.  The drug gives psychedelic and euphoric effects at high doses; however, elevated doses can also increase blood pressure, heart rate and fever.  And some of the other ingredients added into compound can cause unwanted side effects, like liver damage from acetaminophen.  Doh!


So how many knuckleheads are robotripping?  2008 saw 8,000 emergency room visits linked to the pastime--a number up 70% from 2004.  Although FDA officials say the drug is not as widely abused as the painkiller codeine, it is more so than pseudoephedrine, a cold and allergy medicine ingredient that can be processed into methamphetamine.

Ah well, I must admit that whenever I think I've heard it all, something comes along to make go, "What?!?!"  I have heard of kids drinking NyQuil to get high, but they were severely disturbed, going through withdrawals, and the cold medicine was all they could get their hands on.  Eight thousand kids being hospitalized for drinking Robitussin in an age when pot is practically legal for recreational use just blows me away.

Just goes to show you, no matter what you legalize, a new illicit substance will surface in its place because...well, it's more fun to be naughty, apparently. 

Slap a kid the head if you catch him robotripping.  I will.

Kids Cough Less With Honey

A new study shows that a spoonful of honey goes a long way in quieting nighttime cough in children. When compared to cough syrup or no treatment at all, honey showed better results. Chalk one up for natural home remedies.

The authors of the study, which appears in the December issue of Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, believe that the honey may work by coating and soothing an irritated throat. The importance of these findings come on the heels of federal health advisories, which have recently warned that over-the-counter (OTC) cough and cold medicines shouldn't be used in children younger than 6 (129 reported deaths from these products since 1969). As a result, manufacturers are taking some products for babies off the market.

I am personally pleased by these findings, not because I'm a "natural products" guy--I think medications are necessary in many instances--but because I really believe that people run far too often to what I think are useless OTC medications. No medication can carry out the healing process--only the body does that; they are simply easing symptoms that accompany, and are necessary for, healing to occur. So give the kids a dollop of honey and let it ride, baby--just let it ride.