What is the cause of the child's right abdominal cramps?

It is said that children are the flowers of the motherland and the hope of the family. Every child will always be troubled by health problems in the process of growing up. Among them, stomachache is the most common symptom. There are many reasons for this phenomenon. The most painful thing for children is the spasm and pain in the right abdomen of children. When the pain occurs, the child will cry and even roll in pain. This also makes parents feel particularly distressed. However, if you want to better treat it, you must understand the cause. Let’s understand what is going on with the right abdominal spasm in children.

What is the cause of the child's right abdominal cramps?

Intestinal spasm, also known as spasmodic colic, is the most common functional abdominal pain in children with acute abdominal pain. The main clinical feature of this disease is that a normally healthy child suddenly develops paroxysmal, intermittent abdominal pain, and no abnormal physical signs are found during the intermittent periods. The child's abdominal pain may last for several minutes or even dozens of minutes, coming and going. After repeated attacks for tens of minutes or hours, the abdominal pain may no longer occur. For some children, recurrent abdominal pain may last for several days. The severity of the pain varies, and in severe cases the child may roll over on the ground.

treat

Treatment decisions can be made based on the intestinal spasm scoring results. The scores are based on the intensity and duration of the crying, the symptoms associated with the crying, and the parents' views on their children's crying. If the crying and noise are related to intestinal spasm, but the crying and noise are not severe, use the first and second level treatment plans; if it is severe intestinal spasm, use the third level treatment.

1. The first level of treatment is to comfort the child, rock the child, reduce environmental noise, cover the baby's abdomen with a hot water bottle; give support and care to the parents; and take Chinese medicine or dimethyl silicone oil. Some Chinese medicines have antispasmodic effects. After taking Chinese medicine (a powder composed of chamomile, verbena, licorice, fennel, vanilla and mint) for 7 days, intestinal spasms improved, but the number of night awakenings did not decrease. Dimethicone is a non-absorbable drug that changes the surface tension of bubbles, causing them to merge or diffuse, thereby promoting gas discharge and has no side effects on the human body. Tried using it to reduce intestinal gas. But the research results on it are inconsistent. In a crossover study using dimethicone versus placebo, symptoms improved in 1/4-2/3 of the children, but there was no significant difference compared with placebo. Other drugs that reduce intestinal gas, such as activated carbon and α-galactosidase, can absorb gas or help digest high-fiber foods and reduce fermentation gas production, but their effectiveness in treating intestinal spasm is currently uncertain.

2. The second level of treatment is drug treatment. Available antispasmodics (such as cimetropium bromide) can block the muscarinic receptors of smooth muscle and can also act directly on smooth muscle to relieve smooth muscle spasm. If the effect is ineffective, dicyclomine hydrochloride can be used. As an anticholine drug, it has an atropine-like antispasmodic effect and a certain central nervous system sedative effect. It is effective in treating infantile intestinal spasms. However, recent studies have found that infants under 6 months old may suffer from sleep apnea when using this drug, which limits the application of this drug. There is still no completely effective drug to treat intestinal spasms.

Third, tertiary treatment involves changes in diet and/or medication. Breastfeeding mothers do not consume milk, dairy products, fish and eggs; giving bottle-fed babies soy milk or hydrolyzed casein formula can significantly improve infant intestinal spasms. For patients with intestinal spasms caused by CMPI, symptoms improved in 71%-88% of children after removing cow's milk protein and replacing it with soy milk or hydrolyzed protein. Because drug treatments (such as dicyclomine hydrochloride) have certain side effects and are sometimes not effective, dietary changes may be more appropriate than drug treatments.

The above is an introduction to what causes right abdominal cramps in children. After understanding it, we know that such phenomena are generally caused by intestinal spasms. If such symptoms occur, we must take the child to the hospital for treatment. Do not assume that the child has eaten something wrong when he has stomach pain, as this will easily delay the treatment of the disease.