Two Cases of Pneumonia in One Day!

It was another very busy week. I found two cases of pneumonia and two common cough and cold cases. As always, I counseled the mothers to be a little more careful about their babies. They should not let their babies play on the ground, they should keep their babies clean and warm with woolen caps and have them wear a warm sweater. They seemed to know this, but I want them to be more careful! I think the only way to achieve this goal is to repeat my messages again and again to the mothers, fathers and other caregivers. It is not just the mother’s job to look after the baby. Everyone in the household should do it together.

At one household visit, the baby was doing alright. Then a lady came to that house with her 17-month-old baby girl and said “I just found out you were here so I ran to catch you!” Her baby was suffering with a cold and fever. The mother was afraid it would turn into something bad. I was happy to see the awareness in the mother. I counted the baby’s breaths with the timer and found that it was really pneumonia! So I gave the baby cotrim syrup right away and explained the proper dose to the mother. I also advised her to see a doctor if the temperature gets very high at night. I did not want her to take any chances. Most of the time, babies with pneumonia will have a slight temperature, but it should not get very high.

While I was having this conversation with the mother, another lady and her child came to the house to borrow rice. Looking at the baby, I realized right away that he was sick too! In this case, the mother knew her child was sick, but she was not worried. I felt the child’s forehead and counted his breaths with the timer. He had pneumonia too! The mother was surprised. She said, “I had no idea my boy had pneumonia! I checked him and I could hear he was having difficulty breathing, and I could see his chest was going downward, but I thought this was normal so I wasn’t worried.” I was happy to see she had some knowledge, but at the same time I realized she must not be capturing all the information in my counseling. This mother was not worried because for some reason she thought when there’s difficulty breathing and chest in-drawing, it can’t be pneumonia. She didn’t know these actually are the signs of severe pneumonia! A simple cold can turn into pneumonia (which is what happened to this child), and if the child is not well taken care of, that normal pneumonia can turn into severe pneumonia, which is fatal! Well, I could see I needed to do some more counseling with this mother!

I did a little counseling session right there on the spot with those two mothers and a few others who were close by. I gave them general health information, and I talked about diarrhea and pneumonia. I explained several times what pneumonia is and what is severe pneumonia … also what is diarrhea and what is severe diarrhea … and what are the danger signs to watch for. The experience was an eye-opener for me – seriously! I never thought that people could get such a wrong idea from my sessions! In my next Growth Monitoring and Promotion session, I will definitely talk about this issue!

I made a follow-up visit the next day, just to check that the two children were getting the right medication in the right dosage. I was very relieved to see that their temperatures had gone down and they were doing better than the day before. I told the mothers to make sure they continue the medication for five days. And if they have any problems, they should call or come to visit me. The next day I went house to house inviting mothers and caregivers to come to the Growth Monitoring and Promotion session.