What is the cause of the baby's high fever convulsions

It is not uncommon for many infants and young children to have convulsions when they have a high fever. The main cause of convulsions is that the baby's central nervous system is damaged when the baby has a high fever. This phenomenon is one of the emergencies for infants and young children. However, there are many other reasons that may cause high fever and convulsions in babies. Parents must first find out the cause before they can treat it symptomatically. So what exactly is going on when a baby has a high fever and convulsions? Let’s take a look.

Febrile convulsion refers to a sudden convulsion caused by a fever exceeding 38.5℃ due to reasons other than intracranial infection and other pre-existing neurological diseases. The incidence rate in babies under 5 years old is 2% to 5%. Among them, babies aged 6 months to 3 years have the highest incidence rate, with boys more likely to have more seizures than girls. Convulsions also often occur in acute upper respiratory tract infections within 12 hours after the onset of high fever. They are generally short-term, lasting less than 10 seconds, and severe ones may last for more than 10 to 30 minutes. The patient woke up quickly after the attack, and only one convulsion occurred during a high fever.

There are many causes of febrile convulsions in babies, which are often caused by bacterial or viral infections. Such as meningitis, brain abscess, tonsillitis, otitis media, upper respiratory tract infection and bacillary dysentery. The baby's nervous system is underdeveloped, and high fever causes the central nervous system to become overexcited. In addition, the occurrence of febrile convulsions is related to genetic factors. 24% of the sick babies have a family history of febrile convulsions, and 4% have a family history of epilepsy. Studies have suggested that abnormalities in certain genes are the basis for the occurrence of this disease.

The baby usually shows sudden onset of whole body or local muscle spasm, and does not respond when called. The baby's head is tilted back or to one side, the eyes are rolled up or slanted to one side or blink frequently, the face and lips are pale or blackened, the teeth are clenched, and there is foaming at the mouth (if the tongue is bitten, blood foam will be spit out), the limbs are stiff or twitching rhythmically, and incontinence may also occur.

Through the content introduced above, I believe that parents have a more comprehensive understanding of the causes of high fever convulsions in babies. Since the baby's body is not yet fully developed, various inflammations caused by fever are very likely to cause convulsions in the baby. At this time, parents must not panic too much and need to take correct emergency measures to help their baby relieve symptoms.