First aid is vital if it is applied correctly and quickly. All parents need to have first aid information against emergency situations such as burns, electric shocks, poisonings, foreign body ingestion. It requires at least as much attention as the care of children and the monitoring of their nutrition.
If a foreign substance gets into the baby’s throat…
Although it is thought that babies may become clogged when they switch to supplementary food after six months or when they take a foreign object in their hands and unconsciously put it in their mouths, the suckling baby can also become clogged due to the high volume of the mother’s milk. Newborn Nurse Esra Ertuğrul from Canbebe Expert Team says the following about the blockage: “The suckling baby may be blocked due to excess milk from his mother’s breast. Mothers usually try to solve the problem by hitting the baby on the back while the baby is in a horizontal position. But the right thing is to lift the baby and wait for a few seconds without panicking and hitting him on the back. Remember, by hitting, you cause the liquid to escape even further. In fact, it’s the same with adults. If something goes down an adult’s throat, he coughs and the person next to him hits him on the back. In fact, this is the wrong method. We should wait for the blocked person to cough and remove it from his/her throat and not touch it. We would disrupt his concentration by hitting him on the back. ”
The mother can try to breastfeed lying down in front of the milk that is always excess and pressurized from the breast, or she can shear and breastfeed by supporting the brown tip of the breast from below and above while in the upright position. Thus, the flow rate of milk decreases.
With the transition to supplementary food, two different blockages can be encountered: complete blockage and partial blockage. In partial congestion, the baby coughs and manages to remove the escaped food. However, in full congestion, that is, if the food that needs to pass through the esophagus escapes to the trachea, the baby’s breath stops, starts to bruise, and his eyes grow. In this case, it is necessary to quickly perform the heimlich maneuver; because with coughing, the baby cannot solve the congestion. First, it is looked at in the baby’s mouth, then the baby is held with one hand, parallel to the ground and face down. The middle of the two shoulder blades is hit as if sweeping 5 times with the palm of the hand. We should also place a finger on the mouth of our hand holding the baby so that if the swallowed object comes to the mouth through the trachea, we can easily take it out. If we cannot remove the baby by hitting it on the back, it is necessary to apply pressure by rotating the baby 2-3 fingers above the belly button, pressing and pushing the diaphragm. In order not to experience all these dangers, Newborn Nurse Esra Ertuğrul from Canbebe
Expert Team recommends giving soft foods that can be crushed between two fingers for babies who switch to supplementary food. The food we give to a baby who likes to feed himself must have been boiled and softened in steam. While boiled apples and carrots are ideal for this period, we should definitely not give cucumbers and sweet green peppers. For self-feeding babies, such as a game, the World Health Organization definitely does not recommend nuts, despite the possibility of aspirating them to infants up to the age of three. Newborn Nurse Esra Ertuğrul from Canbebe Expert Team recommends mothers to add the nuts to the cake or fruit puree after they are powdered by passing them through the rondo, because it is also dangerous to give them only by crushing. Nuts with high nutritional value can create hazards that can even escape into the baby’s lungs.
Ideal Sleeping Position
The valves on the stomach do not function for the first 3 months of the babies. He can also vomit due to his stomach valve, which cannot do its job when he is overfed. Unfortunately, if the baby in the horizontal position is not tilted to the right or left, he/she may be in danger of suffocation because he/she cannot remove the excess from his/her mouth when he/she vomits. It is pointed out that it is a correct method to lay on the side by supporting the back with a towel or a tiny pillow that is rolled on the back. However, in the lateral position, it is necessary to be careful not to lay all the weight on the lower arm.
First Response to Poisoning
For a baby who eats a chemical substance or breathes toxic gas, the only intervention is to reach the hospital without losing time. It is definitely not the right method to feed breast milk or yogurt to the poisoned baby and make them vomit. Although mothers think that breast milk is good for everything, wasting time by breastfeeding in the face of poisoning and bringing the chemical in the stomach together with breast milk brings more harm than benefit.
Falls and Electric Shock
Babies who start crawling after 7 months are more at risk for bumps and falls. It is appropriate for the first intervention to apply a cold compress to that area for a while after bumps and falls, but if the baby vomits as a result of bumps or falls, his/her gaze becomes meaningless, and a coldness is felt in his/her body, it is absolutely necessary to go to the hospital.
The electric shocked baby should definitely not be touched by panicking. The duration of exposure to electricity is very important. The baby should be quickly disconnected from electricity. For this, you can pull the baby towards you by lassoing a thick and long cover like a blanket, or you can remove the baby from danger with the help of a non-conductive (wooden, plastic) item. If possible, you can also cut off the electricity at home. The severity of the electrical burn varies depending on the duration of contact of electricity with the body, the strength and type of current, where electricity enters the body. The electrical burn is deep and may be more severe on the inside, although it may seem smaller on the outside. If the general condition of the child is good, nothing should be applied to the burn area, cold application should be made, covered with a dry sterile cloth and go to the hospital as soon as possible.
Burns
If the baby is exposed to a burn, it is important to be calm but to intervene urgently. Cooling the burning area is the first thing. If there is no blistering, it is necessary to keep the burning area under running water for 15-20 minutes; because during this time, the lower tissues only cool down. If there is a blister on the burn, it is not exposed to running water, and the bursting of this bubble filled with liquid that heals the burning tissue is avoided. The burning area is kept in a container filled with water for 15-20 minutes. If your child is over 1 year old, you can also put ice in the water-filled container. If the burn is more than a third of the body, a clean sheet is wetted and placed on the watery burn area and tried to be cooled. Substances such as yogurt, olive oil, toothpaste, breast milk should never be applied to the burned area. If the baby has clothes on it, it should be removed gently by cutting it off. Otherwise, the tissue here will be further damaged by dealing with removing the clothing from the burning area.
If the child is conscious, 1 teaspoon of baking soda and 1 teaspoon of salt can be added in 1 liter of water and mixed and sipped. Then you should go to the hospital.