Why does growing hurt even though it doesn't?
Are you interested in winning a Nobel Prize for Medicine? Then we have a tip for you: try to find out why growing hurts even though it doesn't hurt. Sounds mysterious? It is a bit.
So-called growing pains are a very common reason why children present to the practice. The term "growing pains" is actually a misnomer, as we know that growing in itself does not hurt. What we don't know is why so many children of nursery and primary school age repeatedly complain of unclear pain in their legs, and sometimes also in their arms
Well, we don't know either.
And to make it clear what it's all about, we'll continue to talk about growing pains. The important thing is: as a parent, how do I know if the pain is harmless? This is usually easy to recognise. Classic growing pains usually occur in the evening or at night - and the next day everything is over again. The pain is also diffuse. It is sometimes there and sometimes gone, sometimes on the top left, sometimes on the bottom right.
What else is important: See a doctor relatively quickly if your child complains of pain that always occurs in the same place. So if pain occurs permanently and only in the right knee, for example, then please do not wait a few weeks, but have the child examined.
And what can you do about growing pains? Not much. If you know that it is harmless, a little attention and/or a massage can help, perhaps with a normal care cream as a placebo painkiller. If the pain is really severe, then you can also give a painkiller, which the child is entitled to.
As is so often the case, the best news is that it gets better over time. The pain usually stops towards the end of primary school - the problem literally grows away.
Further interesting tips
Hand in mouth
When a baby puts its hand in its mouth, parents almost always have one reflex: there's definitely a tooth coming. If I wanted to live from hand to mouth (not in the original sense, of course), I would have realised my brilliant idea long ago - and invented the so-called dentiometer for the U4 examination.
Immune training
Is it Christmas already? At least when we look at how many children are currently coming into the practice with mild respiratory infections, you could almost think so. While we had virtually no mild infections last autumn and winter, we can hardly save ourselves from children with coughs, colds and fevers. This is extremely atypical for summertime - but it's not bad. Quite the opposite.
U9 screening
Our series on the U examinations continues with the U9 - which is almost like a repeat of the U8.