Tricks for getting medicine into a toddler?

[JessieBird]

DS needs to take some liquid medicine twice a day for ten days. We've tried the first three doses with absolutely no luck at all. I can get the syringe to his mouth but no matter how slowly I squirt it or how quickly or how far back in his throat, etc, he manages to spit it all out. It is banana flavoured sweet stuff. I think it tastes pretty good though it is gritty.

Tonight I'll try mixing it into applesauce or some other food but he's a fussy eater these days so it might be a waste.

Any tips and tricks?

[springmum]

I don't about what to mix it with, but my DS had to take some liquid meds a little while ago.

I would sit him on my lap in front of my computer (although far enough away from the spit zone) and put on the most exciting youtube video I could find (firetruck parades, diggers, snowplow trains...whatever is interesting) Then sneak in little bits at a time - cradling him like an infant at times if it looked like he was going to spit it out. He didn't like the first few days, then looked forward to his "watch a video" time.

[LROM]

We literally just finished a 10-day dose of antibiotics this way and had to figure this out.

What worked for us was 3 things:

1. Putting dd on the bed and kneeling at her head, basically putting her head between my knees so she couldn't turn it. That may sound bad, but it didn't hurt her and she didn't resist that so much as she did the medicine itself. Also gave me the ability to keep her hands away from the syringe if I was doing it alone.

2. If we put the syringe between her teeth and put some medicine in her mouth, it seemed like she couldn't spit it out. She tried! But it kinda prevented her from spitting to have the wide part of it between her teeth. This allowed to slowly get the whole syringe full in with very little spit out.

3. I showed her the syringe and said "It's Good Girl time again" (she picked up on the phrase "good girl!" which I said every time she swallowed) and let her play with it before and after giving her the medicine. She resisted during the medicine but before and after she grinned and said "Good girl! Good girl!" so she seemed to survive the 10 day ordeal just fine.

Hope that helps!

[gbailey]

Mixing with apple sauce has always worked for us. Hope it worked for your little one.

[lilbear]

We have a few tricks that work for our little one (18 months):

1) Hands busy: We give her the cordless phone and say, it's for you, The doctor says you need to take your medicine. (And she plays with the phone and while I give her the medicine).

2) We give her an empty medicine syringe (not the needle kind, but the dispenser kind) and she gives me a 'pretend' dose while I give her the real one.

3) We mix it in with water in a rock's glass, if it's soluble, and she drinks it.

Hope this helps....

Anne.

[LROM]

Hmmm, sounds like if she gets sick again, we should try the applesauce approach - sounds much easier on all involved if it works.

[JessieBird]

Originally Posted by lilbear

We give her the cordless phone and say, it's for you, The doctor says you need to take your medicine.

Too funny! DS loves the phone so this might just work.

[justKate]

Here's what we do, because she will NEVER go along willingly with someone else putting something in her mouth:

1) keep arms down/busy. Easiest way is to have Huz cradle her tightly against him.
2) insert syringe thingie into back cheek pocket (think the space outside of the teeth/gums but inside of the cheek, as far back as you can safely achieve). This keeps the tounge from thrusting the medicine forward.
3) put in 1/2 dose, blow air in DD's face, keep her reclining.
4) put in rest of dose, blow air in DD's face, celebrate how brave she is.



Works for us.

[nelson]

After two days of DS refusing his meds, DH told him that it "tastes just like juice" and after that DS took it willingly. I think that he just wanted control and us forcing him to take it was not going to happen, it just turned into a power struggle. (Obviously it is not good to teach kids that medicine is "juice" but we did tell him it was still medicine and we of course always kept it out of his reach.)

[JessieBird]

So here's my report after two more doses: mixing with applesauce didn't work at all. The medicine (Biaxin) tastes good at first but it has these little gritty grains in it that taste absolutely horrid. So any kind of chewing or letting it linger in your mouth is disgusting. I think DS has been turned off of applesauce for a long time! This technique may be effective with other medicines though.

What did work was holding him in front of fun youtube videos (vintage Sesame Street, the Wubba song aka Monster in the Mirror). He still resisted the medicine but was immediately distracted and forgot all about it within a second instead of collapsing in tears.

We also switched to a small dropper-style syringe (from the Tylenol bottle) in the side of his cheek instead of the big plunger that the bottle came with in the middle back of his mouth. The small syringe required 3 doses fill-ups of 1 but he was much more accpeting of it.

Thanks for the ideas and hope this helps others!