POSTED BY:
Judith Feick, MD

The flu is usually far from our minds in summertime, but an announcement by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) about the nasal spray vaccine FluMist has put influenza back at the forefront. Come this fall, the FluMist nasal spray won’t be offered to anyone — flu shots will be the only option available for the young and old. If you have kids who panic at the mere mention of a needle, here’s what you need to know. The Lowdown on the FluMist News Recently, a CDC committee made up of a panel of immunization experts announced that they were no longer recommending FluMist for the upcoming 2016-2017 flu season. The FluMist nasal spray is the only flu vaccine that comes in a form other than an injection (shot). You may have heard FluMist referred to by the more formal name “live attenuated influenza vaccine (LAIV).” So why […]

As your kiddo’s sniffling and sneezing like crazy, it can be hard to decipher whether it’s just a common cold (or other upper respiratory virus) that will soon pass, or if it’s the product of seasonal allergies (sometimes called “hay fever” or “seasonal allergic rhinitis”) that may need treatment. Seasonal allergies can start at almost any time (although kids usually develop them by 10 years old and experience the worst symptoms in their early 20s, with symptoms often going away later in adulthood). But even kids who’ve never had seasonal allergies before can suddenly develop them out of the blue. So here are some clues to help you and your child’s doctor figure out what’s going on. The symptoms Symptoms for both allergies and the common cold can include a runny or stuffy nose, sneezing, fatigue and coughing, so it’s easy to confuse the two. In addition to those other […]

If you start to take weekly bike rides with your second-grader or go on daily walks with your teen, chances are, the drive to exercise just might start to kick in. A recent study by researchers at Northwestern University found that kids tend to copy their parents’ unhealthy habits. Now this doesn’t mean you aren’t entitled to your chill time too, such as sitting and reading a book or playing cheap PC games once in a while. Everyone is entitled to spend some time each day chilling out and doing what they enjoy. However, showing your children that a small amount of exercise each day is important will benefit them in the long run. So your example might have more of an effect than you think. Although some issues such as obesity, high blood pressure and high cholesterol can be genetic, they are also affected by lifestyle. The study found […]