Pediatric Urgent Care

Many school systems across the country are seeing increases in confirmed cases of COVID-19 among their student bodies. The threat appears to be especially great in elementary schools, which are full of children who so far are not recommended to get vaccinated. As such, it’s very possible that urgent care centers will start seeing more children who have been exposed, whether they’re symptomatic or not. Ensure you have adequate testing supplies and, in preparation for …

Cases of COVID-19 in children grew 62% between August 5 and September 9 of this year (from 93,824 to 243,373), according to data collected from state departments of health by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association. Hospitalizations are up among infected children, too, according to a report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The scary part is, these data were collected before schools even opened up in many big …

The COVID-19 pandemic was already on the upswing as schools started opening up across the country this year. Given that many children are too young to be vaccinated even if their parents would be so inclined, and many schools have declined to impose mask mandates, it’s reasonable to be concerned that we could see even more cases among younger patients as the next few weeks progress. So, this year more than most others, it would …

As readers of JUCM News know, it appeared early in the COVID-19 pandemic that children were either at reduced risk for COVID-19 compared with adults or less likely to become severely ill and die from the virus. And, in fact, the virus has proven less hazardous for younger patients compared with adults. If new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are any indication, however, the Delta variant is another story altogether. The …

More than a year and a half into the COVID-19 pandemic—and in the midst of a national surge in cases—we’re still trying to figure out the virus’s impact on children. While it seems they’re less directly affected in adults, it’s widely accepted that they can have (and spread) the disease while being largely asymptomatic, but also that they’re susceptible to multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C). And what about “long haulers” among children? Parents are …

It took a while for the general public—and even some clinicians—to accept that COVID-19 really is dangerous for children. While it’s true that fewer children died or experienced severe disease compared with adults, it’s now been shown that there is some degree of risk. And, of course, there’s always the danger that a child can infect an older person who is at great risk for a poor outcome. Likewise, it’s important to know that children, …

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s admonition that the southern portion of the United States could see a surge of respiratory syncytial virus cases this summer is coming to fruition as we speak—although the scope of the problem appears to be much broader than the CDC anticipated. While the southeast is leading the way in terms of number of cases, RSV (usually higher in the winter) is more prevalent than would be expected for …

One condition of children attending summer camps across the country is often that they wear masks to inhibit possible spread of the COVID-19 virus. Some school districts have already said they plan to do the same when the next academic year begins. At the same time, some parents claim that forcing their kids to wear masks is not only excessive compared with the actual risk to children, but that such a practice actually puts them …