Suspected chicken pox in unvaccinated and partially vaccinated children under 3
**PLEASE NOTE** Both of my children are up to date on their vaccinations according to the AAP vaccine schedule. My apologies for not making the title more clear in my initial post
My husband and I (physician and nurse) are stumped and can’t seem to come to an agreement. My son broke out in a rash on his buttocks, face, wrists and ankles on Saturday morning. He only complained about his buttocks and feet being itchy along with his “mouth hurting”. It might have had a low grade fever but I never checked his temp and gave him Motrin and Tylenol for comfort. The rash spread slightly up his arms and legs, but never appeared on his trunk.
Sunday night, my daughter (age 9mo) did not eat her dinner and appeared to be hesitant to put anything in her mouth, she was also drooling a lot so we assumed this was teething related. She woke up 2 hours after she went to bed screaming and crying, but eventually went back to sleep after we gave her some Motrin and let her sleep with us.
Monday morning, she wakes up with a rash on her face, predominantly perioral. She had a low grade “fever” of 100.3 (auxiliary) and some small red dots on the posterior surfaces of her hands and feet. I took her to the peds ER and all they said was “viral rash” treat with Motrin, Tylenol, and Benadryl and sent us on our way. Today, the rash has spread in a similar pattern as my sons (up her arms and legs). She has a slight rash in her groin area and on her back, but that mostly looks like heat rash (it’s 90 degrees where we live).
Both children’s rashes have started to crust over in 12-24 hours. The behavior of this illness is bizarre and it doesn’t follow the same trajectory as chickenpox based on what my husband and I learned in school. I will include pictures for reference.