Rash?? eek!

Emery woke up this morning with a huge rash on her face, neck and chest.  EEK!!!  Her first official rash.  :(  I immediately called a doctor friend of mine and gave him the run down.  Here's the course of events over the past 6 weeks.

Week 1 - Really bad cold with horrible wet, productive cough

Week 2-4 - better but cough turned dry and consistent, clear runny nose

Week 5 - mild cold again! cough still dry... finally took her to doctor who found the start of a mild ear infection in the left ear.  Started Amoxicillin. Bought a hepa air filter and cough finally stopped!!  yippee!!  still runny nose

Week 6 - still constant runny nose.  In the middle of the week, she had a fever of 100.8 ax but was cutting a tooth.  Tylenol and it was better the next day.  After the air filter, she finally slept through the night for 4 nights, but has been up every night, multiple times the last 3 nights.  Been giving teething tablets, Tylenol, honey elixir and finally Benadryl, along with cold mist humidifier and now hepa filter.

Today (end of week 6) - She wakes up with a rash :(

So after I talked with my friend, I gave her benadryl and she went down for a nap.  When she woke up 3 hours later, the rash was worse!  Its slowly working its way down her back, abdomen, arms and hands.  I finally decided to take her to urgent care and have someone look at her... her ears, throat, lymph nodes....  Luckily we got right in and the NP confirmed everything my friend told me.  There are two possibilities... 1) she is having an allergic reaction to the Amoxicillin.  Apparently, an anaphylactic rxn would happen within hours.  But a mild rxn, such as a rash, occurs 6-10 days after start of med.  Well its day 7!  However, itchiness is a sign of allergic rxn which I haven't noticed her scratching more than usual with the mild excema.  So... 2) its a viral rxn to the cold.  Basically he said the rash is the by-product of the virus and the body colliding.  So, we treat the symptoms.  Benadryl around the clock until it clears up.  And for the first time, this NP said she has allergies.  Every other doctor tells you children this age don't get allergies.  Yah right!  Not in this central valley!  So after the benadryl is done, I can use Zyrtec or Claritan for the allergies.  After 6 days of finally no cough, she started coughing again yesterday.  She coughs herself into gagging!  I slept on the floor of her room last night simply because it was easier than getting all comfy in bed only to have to get up again.  She was coughing and then gagging half the night!  Poor baby. :(   But all in all, doctor said its not contagious.  Not any more than a typical cold already is.  (so for all my playdate girls yesterday.... no worries :)

 This was first thing this morning.

 This was after her nap :(

Well she is back to nap again after another dose of benadryl.  Although this freaked me out a little, I learned a lot.  And I feel fine now.  I just feel for her.  She looks so much worse than she really is.  She was smiling real big at a woman in the urgent care... right through that face of horrible rash! lol   This is why I love being a pediatric nurse.  They are super duper little troopers!!!!