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Pharmacy Links

CHILDREN AND MUMPS

28th April 2009

Symptoms: low-grade fever; loss of appetite; headache; swelling of the salivary glands.

Home care:

The child with mumps needs rest. Give aspirin or paracetamol for pain and fever.

Do not give the child spicy foods.

Isolate the child from other family members.

Precautions

- Make sure that your child is vaccinated against mumps.

- One attack of mumps provides lifelong immunity. If the child has had mumps, but develops symptoms similar to those of mumps, the problem is some other disease of the salivary glands. Report the problem to the doctor.

- If mumps involves the ovaries or pancreas, the child will have abdominal pain. If the testes are involved, the testes will be swollen and tender.

- If a child who has not been vaccinated is exposed to mumps, he or she can receive the vaccine shortly after exposure to the disease to prevent becoming ill with mumps.

Mumps is a moderately contagious infection caused by a specific virus which involves the salivary glands. It is contracted by contact with the saliva of an infected person. The incubation period – the time it takes for symptoms to develop once the child has been exposed to the virus – for mumps is 14 to 21 days, and the disease can be passed on any time from two or more days before symptoms appear until all symptoms have gone. One attack provides lifelong immunity; if a child has had mumps and subsequently develops similar symptoms, the problem is not mumps but some other disease of the salivary gland.

Complications of mumps include meningitis, encephalitis, permanent deafness, and orchitis (inflammation of the male sex glands called the testes). The disease may also involve the ovaries, the female sex glands, or cause an infection of the pancreas.

A vaccine is available to prevent mumps. It is usually given in combination with measles and rubella (German measles) vaccines during the child’s second year at around 15 months of age. This vaccine is 95 percent effective in preventing mumps.