RSV Season is here.....what you need to know!

RSV Season is here….what you need to know!

I had never heard of RSV prior to realizing that I would be having a preemie, so, I’m going to assume most of my friends and family have not heard of it either, but you need to know about it, especially for those who will or plan on having any contact with Mallory between now and April.

RSV is something that we have all probably had, in adults and older children it shows up as a bad cold, in preemies and those with lung problems, it develops into a severe lower respiratory virus that infects the lungs and breathing passages and can cause hospitalization.

What Mallory had back in June was a Respiratory Virus that landed her in the hospital, but wasn’t RSV. RSV is typically worse, so that’s why, although some of you may feel as though I’m going a little “over the top” because she “looks” fine now, I don’t care. You can't "see" how well her lungs function and after the issue at 2 1/2 months, I'm more concerned than I probably would have been if that hadn't happened. I will take all precautions possible for her first winter to avoid RSV and keep from being in the hospital again. After the first winter if she hasn’t had any other lung/breathing/respiratory viruses we will not have to be so diligent in the future.

There is a medication called Synagis that is used to help prevent a serious lung disease caused by RSV in infants and children at high risk. Unfortunately for us it doesn’t appear as though Mallory will qualify for this medication, which is given as a shot once a month during RSV season. She meets some of the qualifications, such as born before 35 weeks, attending day care, etc., but not enough for insurance to cover it, and if I want to pay for it out of pocket, I think it’s about $2500 a shot. I’m going to discuss again when we go to her 6 month check-up on the 5th of October, but I’m not getting my hopes up.

So, even though she doesn’t meet the “high risk” qualification based on insurance, that means we have to be that much more diligent because we can’t get the medication.

Here are the basics on preventing RSV:

• Must wash hands with warm soapy water or use hand sanitizer prior to handling baby.

• Must keep baby away from dense crowds such as shopping centers and churches.

• Keep baby away from people with cold-like symptoms.

• If it’s not possible (because parent has a cold) to keep those sick totally away from baby, be sure to keep disinfected as possible and if one must touch/handle the baby, to use a mask and wash hands often.

• Limit the time that the baby spends in child-care centers or other potentially contagious settings during RSV season. (Obviously we cannot avoid this completely but Mallory is kept away from the other kids)

Ben and I are starting today taking Airborne everyday to help ward off us contracting any colds too.

So, although I’m hoping for the best and an uneventful RSV season, it is something that I’m concerned about, especially after the episode we had in June. It really scared me that night we had to rush Mallory to the ER and I would prefer to avoid a similar situation again at all cost.

So, please don’t be upset if I don’t want to attend church or hit the malls during Christmas season with Mallory and I ask that if you or someone you are close to has a cold, to please avoid being around us and let us know prior to being in contact with us. Christmas and Thanksgiving will be interesting and we will hope no one is very sick and don’t be surprised if you get lots of hand sanitizer from me and don’t expect to get much one-on-one Mallory time if you are cold-ish.

I know many people who do go on absolute lock down during their first RSV season and will not even let anyone in their house. I’m going to attempt to avoid going that far, but things will probably be more limited over these upcoming winter months and I will probably go through a lot of purell and Lysol.

For more info on RSV, here’s a few sites that might explain things in a more “medical” manner than what I did.

http://www.synagis.com/Default.aspx

http://www.lungusa.org/lung-disease/respiratory-syncytial-virus/preventing-rsv.html

http://www.aap.org/advocacy/releases/rsv.htm