Doctors have issued warnings to parents that they should be very careful when giving smaller doses of adult painkiller and anti-fever medication to children amid reports of shortages of Tylenol and other drugs.
“It’s probably a very dangerous maneuver, number one, because children and infants are dosed very differently than adults,” Dr. Jay Schauben of the Florida Poison Information Center told News4Jax over the weekend. “And just by cutting tablets in half, you may not be giving them the correct dose—you may be overdosing them, or you may be underdosing them,” he added.
But Barry Power, a pharmacist and editor-in-chief of the Canadian Pharmacists Association, told GlobalNews that adult Advil or Tylenol can be given to children, but that parents must ensure that a proper dose is given so as to avoid potentially harmful side-effects or an overdose. “It’s easy to give the wrong amount,” he said….