Over the Counter Cough and Cold Drugs for Infants Recalled

A few days ago, announcements of drug recalls bombarded the news. Makers of  cough and cold drugs that were being marketed for infants (2 years old and under) were recalled voluntarilly and will not be coming back again. This is due to instances of overdose.

Most of us have given our babies some sort of cold and cough medicine at one point or another. And if you have done this, I'm sure you have noticed that these so called infant medicine do not have doses for children under 2 years of age. So how did we figure out the correct dose? Hopefully you contacted your pediatrician in one form or another. Fortunately for my family, our pediatrician has a website that listed doses for all sorts of medicine. But even then, it wasn't easy. Formulation for cold medicine changed a while back (because of teens using them as recreational drugs), which made it more difficult to find correct doses because while medicines in pharmacy counters had the new formula, doses posted on websites had the old formula. Another problem is that you may know the dose for a cough medicine, but this may not apply for medicines that are for both cough and cold.

Do you see how it's all too easy to overdose our little ones?

So what are we to do during those sleepless nights when our babies are miserable and can't sleep? Well, experts are recommending to stick with humidifiers, saline sprays and nasal aspirators and plain old acetaminophen (Tylenol).

Here are the brands that have been pulled off from stores:

• Dimetapp® Decongestant Plus Cough Infant Drops
• Dimetapp® Decongestant Infant Drops
• Little Colds® Decongestant Plus Cough
• Little Colds® Multi-Symptom Cold Formula
• PEDIACARE® Infant Drops Decongestant (containing pseudoephedrine)
• PEDIACARE® Infant Drops Decongestant & Cough (containing pseudoephedrine)
• PEDIACARE® Infant Dropper Decongestant (containing phenylephrine)
• PEDIACARE® Infant Dropper Long-Acting Cough
• PEDIACARE® Infant Dropper Decongestant & Cough (containing phenylephrine)
• Robitussin® Infant Cough DM Drops
• Triaminic® Infant & Toddler Thin Strips® Decongestant
• Triaminic® Infant & Toddler Thin Strips® Decongestant Plus Cough
• TYLENOL® Concentrated Infants' Drops Plus Cold
• TYLENOL® Concentrated Infants' Drops Plus Cold & Cough

If you already have these in your household, they still work. There is nothing wrong with them and you can certainly keep using them. But if you're worried of the possibility of overdose, it is best to discard them, or perhaps see if you can get a refund. Also, note that this is a voluntary recall by the makers of the above medicine. Some other makers may keep their infant formulation in the shelves.

The bottom line is that from now on, a lot of experts are saying that children under 2 should not be given anything for cough and cold.

Here are websites for more information:

http://www.chpa-info.org/ChpaPortal/

http://www.chpa-info.org/ChpaPortal/PressRoom/NewsReleases/2007/10_02_07_PediatricCoughCold.htm

http://www.tylenol.com/page.jhtml?id=tylenol/news/subpcccoldmed.inc

http://www.dimetapp.com/fda/faq.asp?lang=en

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