CHILDREN’S HEALTH: SHINGLES
Symptoms
Listlessness; fever; pain and tenderness along a nerve; blistery rash; enlarged lymph nodes
Home care
Give paracetamol, not aspirin, to relieve pain.
Precautions
- People who have shingles may transmit chicken pox. Consult the doctor if your child has not had chicken pox, or J is at high risk from the complications J of chicken pox, and is exposed to someone with shingles.
- A child who is taking steroid medications is at high risk from contracting chicken pox from someone with shingles.
- If shingles involves the eye, consult an eye specialist.
Shingles is an acute infection that produces crops of blisters on the skin. It’s caused by the varicella zoster virus which also causes chicken pox, and people who develop shingles have had chicken pox at some time in the past. Presumably, after a bout of chicken pox, the varicella zoster virus lies inactive in the body until, for some reason, it is reactivated to cause shingles. Shingles is unusual in children under ten years of age, but it becomes increasingly common as the child gets older. One attack of shingles almost always provides lifelong immunity.
The initial symptoms of shingles are listlessness, fever, and pain, and tenderness along the path of a nerve. Shingles usually erupts on the chest, back, or abdomen, but it can occur along a nerve in the head or face, and it can involve an eye. In a few days red pimples appear on the skin, and nearby lymph nodes enlarge. The pimples turn into blisters that dry out and form scabs in five to six days. New outbreaks may continue to appear for up to a week; both rash and pain disappear within one to five weeks.
The diagnosis is based on the typical appearance of the rash – which is confined to the length of one or two nerves – and the pain. Before the rash appears the pain, which is sometimes intense, may be similar to that caused by pleurisy (inflammation of the lining of the chest cavity), an acute abdominal condition, or heart pain. In doubtful cases diagnosis of shingles is made on the basis of the results of blood tests.
Home care
The only effective treatment consists of giving paracetamol, not aspirin, to reduce the pain.
Precautions
• If shingles involves the eye, consult an eye specialist.
• People who have shingles may transmit chicken pox. If your child is at high risk from the complications of chicken pox (for example, if the child is taking steroids, which suppress the body’s immunity to disease) and is exposed to someone with shingles, the child should see a doctor.
Medical treatment
Your doctor may give zoster immune globulin (ZIG) or immune serum globulin (ISG) to a child who runs a risk from contracting chicken pox and who has been exposed to shingles.
*183/84/5*
