Pediatrics
The purpose of pediatric medicine is to help parents receive appropriate, professional care and advices for their children. Pediatricians have chosen this profession to help parents and their children deal with physical and mental difficulties from birth to adulthood.
What exactly can pediatricians help with?
- When a newborn arrives home, they help to create and develop appropriate lifestyle habits for the family. Give advice on feeding, baby care, sleeping habits.
- In questions related to growth, movement-, mental development in infancy.
- They assist with numerous illnesses, such as catarrhal diseases with fever, childhood infectious diseases, musculoskeletal problems, eating disorders, recurrent abdominal complaints, indigestion, delayed speech development, or toilet (potty) training.
- You may want to consult your doctor about recurrent catarrhal diseases, recurrent skin lesions, bedwetting, musculoskeletal problems, or gastrointestinal problems.
- May be visited due to night and / or daytime symptoms caused by sleep disorders.
- Can help overweight children make the right lifestyle change.
- To discuss and administer optional vaccinations.
- Can be contacted with any acute problem or persistent complaint that interferes with the child's and / or parent's / family's daily activities.
- May help with performing and evaluating laboratory tests for an acute illness or a chronic condition.
- A careful pediatric examination and a detailed discussion of the antecedents and conditions contribute to the best possible understanding and acceptance of the conditions that do not show a temporary abnormality.
- With their help, the necessary medicines and supplies can be collected and set in our home pharmacy, or we can discuss with them what we should definitely take on a trip.
- They can professionally investigate complaints in our various clinics, e.g. allergology, otolaryngology, dermatology.
Infant hip ultrasound screening:
The primary goal of infant hip ultrasound examination is the early detection and exclusion of congenital hip sprains and hip joint underdevelopment.
(In Europe, 1-2 out of 1,000 babies are born with a hip sprain. If it has previously occurred in the family, or in the case of twin pregnancy, breech recumbency, etc., the development disorder of the hip joints is more common.)
It is advisable to carry out an ultrasound examination of babies' hips as early as 4-6 weeks of age, because a hip sprain detected at this time can still be easily corrected with conservative orthopaedic treatment.
The hip ultrasound can be performed later (up to around 5-6 months of age), but a hip sprain detected later can only be repaired with surgery.
Hip ultrasound examination is painless and takes only a few minutes. The baby is examined in the side-lying position, and the development of the hip joint is evaluated by measuring a special angle:
- In the case of well-developed, mature hip joints, no further check-up is necessary.
- In the case of physiologically immature hip joints, it is recommended to repeat the ultrasound examination after a few weeks.
- In case of hip sprain and hip dysplasia, an urgent orthopaedic examination is required to start the treatment as soon as possible and to ensure a good recovery.
Infant cranial ultrasound:
During the ultrasound of the babies' skull, the brain tissue and the brain chambers are examined through the large fontanelle located on the top of the head.
Ultrasound is not suitable for assessing the finer structural differences of the brain, but it can be used to screen for enlargement of the cerebral ventricles, grosser brain tissue abnormalities, developmental disorders, abnormalities suggestive of infections acquired during pregnancy, etc. Thus enabling further examinations (e.g. neurological, skull MR, etc.) and early treatment of certain diseases.
Cranial ultrasound examination is also recommended as a screening test, but it is definitely recommended in case of foetal ultrasound abnormality detected during pregnancy, premature birth, increased head circumference growth, neurological complaints.
It is usually done at 6-8 weeks of age, but it can also be done later, until the large fontanelle is closed. The examination is painless and takes a few minutes.