What causes alcohol poisoning in babies?

When it comes to physical cooling, everyone may know that wiping the body of a patient with fever with medical alcohol can have a cooling effect. However, doctors in many hospitals now do not recommend using alcohol to physically cool babies, because there have been incidents of babies suffering from alcohol poisoning when this method was used to physically cool babies. So what exactly is going on with baby alcohol poisoning? How should it be solved?

First of all, industrial alcohol contains a large amount of methanol, which is highly toxic and has the greatest impact on the human nervous system and blood system. It will produce toxic reactions if ingested through the digestive tract, respiratory tract or skin. Babies' skin is tender and has strong absorption capacity, so they can easily absorb methanol. The damage of methanol to the brain's nervous system can be said to be fatal. Therefore, if you use industrial alcohol to wipe the baby's body, it is one of the causes of alcohol poisoning in the baby.

Second, it should be noted that neither industrial alcohol nor medical alcohol is suitable for physical cooling of young children. Alcohol evaporates from the skin faster than water, taking away more heat faster and more easily, making it more likely to cause chills. Alcohol can be absorbed into the blood through the skin, and the ethanol component in it can also have an adverse effect on the baby's health.

Third, how should we provide correct physical cooling for young children?

1. Wear less clothes, cover less quilts, and let the baby drink more warm water;

2. Use warm water bath or warm towel to wipe the baby's body;

3. Use a small amount of ice compress appropriately, and apply cold or ice compress to the child’s head or large blood vessels.

4. Ice pillow for head.

5. Drink more warm water, vegetable juice and fruit juice. Let your baby drink more water and replenish body fluids. This is the most basic method of reducing fever. It is very effective and practical and suitable for all babies with fever.

6. Soak your feet in hot water.

From the above information, it can be seen that if the child's fever does not exceed 38.5℃, it is recommended to use only physical cooling. However, if it exceeds 38.5℃ or the child has a history of convulsions, antipyretics should be used in time. When cooling your baby physically, try not to use alcohol. Be sure to follow the doctor's instructions to perform physical cooling to avoid alcohol poisoning in your baby.