The most frequent problems a child can have are the respiratory affections. They impress the parent with the symptoms these affections give and worry him too much. Some parents are not well informed on respiratory infections for example, and adopt protection measures for their child and other children which are totally not necessary. Quite frequently, parents ask the doctor whether they have to keep their child isolated from other children until the sore throat or ear infection is cured because they believe that the child is very contagious.



The doctor will tell them that sore throats can be caused by a viral or bacterial infection. The virus generally gives the symptoms of a cold like: runny nose, cough or watery eyes, while the sore throat caused by bacteria does not give symptoms which look like those in a cold. A throat infection with bacteria is also known as a strep throat.

The best thing to do in order to give an accurate diagnosis is to test the patient and see exactly who causes the sore throat. It is known that antibiotic drugs can not treat infections caused by viruses and in this case the only thing a doctor can do is treat the pain associated with the sore throat. The human organism will fight the viral infection by its own.

The strep throats are treated with antibiotic drugs. Generally a child who follows a treatment with antibiotics will be able to go to school after 24 hour of treatment as it is considered no longer infectious.

The virus infection of a throat is infectious for others long before the symptoms are visible, so the child can continue to go to school even though he has a viral sore throat.

When talking about ear infections, it is more difficult to see whether they are produced by a virus or a bacterium like in the case of a sore throat. Getting liquid from behind the ear drum is too difficult to be made so testing the patient for an etiology of the disease is hard.

Studies say that up to one third of the ear infections are caused by viruses and they do not need antibiotic treatment. As the doctors can't find out which patient has a viral ear infection and which has a bacterial ear infection antibiotic treatment will be prescribed to all the patients. The ear infections are not contagious so parents should not keep their children away from the daily activities and from other children.

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