When a child is sick and nursing a fever, it is extremely important to monitor his/her body temperature on a regular basis.  And when monitoring, it’s not as simple as placing our hands on their forehead.  Yes, it may give us an idea whether or not fever is present, but taking the child’s temperature using the thermometer is the only way to know for sure.

There are so many thermometers available in the market today. With options just available at hand,  it can be tricky to decide which are the best and which are the most accurate.  When Nico was born in April 2004, I remembered it clearly that a thermometer was included in the Hospital kit given to us.  It was a mercury thermometer though, and while I loved the fact that it’s free, we didn’t take the freebie with us at home.

First and foremost, I don’t know how to get the reading from a Mercury thermometer. Haha! Shameful of me there, but yes, I find it hard looking for that “silver line thingie” inside that little piece of glass.  And good thing, it was a blessing that I don’t know how to use it, as Mercury thermometers, I just learned years back, is no longer recommended due to the dangers and the toxins associated with it. In fact, our Philippine Department of Health had issued Administrative Order No. 2008-0021 which orders the phase out of mercury in local health care facilities and institutions, included the order for Hospitals to discontinue the distribution of mercury thermometers to patients in their admission/discharge Hospital kit.

Our choice instead was that of a digital thermometer, the auxiliary (under the arm) type.   It didn’t take long however and soon when Nico was christened a weeks after his birth, we received a Braun ear thermometer as one of the gifts. It’s very easy to use and gives a quite fast reading.

However, Nico’s pedia at that time, advised us that we still stick with the digital one.  According to the doctor, there are several situations where an ear thermometer cannot provide an accurate reading. And this is especially true in infants younger than three months old as their ear canals are very small and can prevent you from correctly positioning the thermometer in the child’s ear.

But now that Nico’s older and has big ear holes at that, we’re back at using the ear thermometer. I assumed it though that Nico don’t have much ear wax as it can cause the reading not to be accurate.

(Images courtesy of http://www.ci.orono.mn.us and http://braun.com)