Teething an Unlikely Cause of Serious Symptoms

From Reuters Health Information

By Amy Norton

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) Aug 09 2011-
High fevers and other potentially serious symptoms in infants should not be written off as normal signs of teething, according to a new study.
The study, which followed 47 infants over eight months, found that teething typically caused fairly mild problems -- including irritability, drooling, a day or so of diarrhea and poor sleep.
But it was not linked to any serious symptoms, like high fevers or prolonged bouts of diarrhea.
The findings, reported online August 8 in Pediatrics, are in line with other studies that have failed to connect teething to severe signs and symptoms.
"We should look for other causes for the signs and symptoms, before attributing them to the eruption of primary teeth," lead researcher Dr. Joana Ramos-Jorge told Reuters Health in an email.
On days when babies had a tooth erupt, they typically had a slight increase in temperature, explained Dr. Ramos-Jorge, a pediatric dentist at the Federal University of Minas Gerais in Brazil.
But they did not have outright fevers.
The findings are based on 47 Brazilian infants between the ages of 5 and 15 months. Over eight months, researchers visited their homes daily to take the babies' temperature, check for tooth eruptions and interview mothers about any symptoms.
Overall, the study found, the babies were more likely to be fussy or have diarrhea, sleep problems or a poor appetite on the day a tooth emerged, or the day after. But the symptoms weren't severe or prolonged.

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/nzb2mq  Pediatrics 2011.