My child has a high fever but his hands and feet are cold. Why?

Adults are very worried when children have a fever. Some children sweat but their hands and feet are cold when they have a fever. This situation has a medical explanation, so if a child experiences this phenomenon, physical cooling must be performed, and in an emergency, the child should be sent to the hospital in time. When the seasons change, many children are prone to catching colds. So, why do children have a high fever but cold hands and feet?

Since infants and young children have more active metabolism than adults and their temperature regulation center is not fully developed, their normal body temperature is higher than that of adults. However, there is a certain fluctuation in body temperature between day and night, which is low in the morning and high in the afternoon, but the fluctuation range does not exceed 1°C. Taking the axillary temperature as an example, the normal body temperature is between 36 degrees Celsius and 37.4 degrees Celsius. Generally, 37.5-38.5 is low fever, 38.1-39 is moderate fever, and 39.1-40.4 is high fever. 40.5 and above is considered a very high fever.

Having a fever but cold hands and feet is a phenomenon of false cold and true heat, which is especially common in infants and young children under 3 years old. This is mainly because babies (especially infants) have less blood in their limbs than in their internal organs. Due to insufficient blood supply to their limbs, they are more likely to feel cold than adults. In addition, the baby's nervous system is not yet fully developed, and the autonomic nerves responsible for managing vasodilation and contraction are prone to disorder, causing the small blood vessels at the ends of the limbs to be in a spasmodic contraction state and become cold when the high fever first occurs.

Ambient temperature

Because children's central nervous system is not yet fully developed, their ability to regulate body temperature is imperfect. If the ambient temperature is low, children's hands will be exposed to the outside for a longer period of time, so their hands and feet will become cold.

The above is the answer to the question of why children have a high fever but cold hands and feet. Generally speaking, people sweat when they have a fever, but some children have cold hands and feet when they have a fever. This may happen when the child is sleeping or catching a cold at some point. When the child has a high fever, the best way is to send the child to the hospital and do not give the child any medicine indiscriminately.