How to Help Your Baby Deal With the Dreaded Vaccination Day

By Dr Apoorva - Updated: June 1, 2019

Vaccines are important and no matter how much you hate seeing your baby in utter pain and discomfort, you just cannot avoid vaccines.

Thanks to advances in medicine, we have painless vaccines now that lead to no swelling at the site of injection or fever afterwards. However, the shot itself is painful!! I have seen adults shake at the sight of an injection, so it is quite evident that vaccines are painful. As a parent, you can help to take at least some pain out of the entire thing. Here I’m sharing some tips:

Firstly, this is my personal hack and I do not say that everyone should follow it. You may give it a try if you wish. I give a little bit of Crocin to my daughter 30 minutes before getting her injected. The mom logic being, it inevitably pains a little after injection and mostly, we do give Crocin anyhow after the shot. Giving it before the shot, I feel reduces the pain experienced by the baby further.

Numbing the area where the shot needs to be given with help of cold pack application and spraying topical anaesthesia decreases the perception of pain. These are called Eutectic anaesthesia sprays and you can readily get them at chemists.

Ice packs are helpful in numbing the skin before shots and reducing the pain and swelling after shots. Please do not put these directly on babies skin, wrap in a cotton clothes and then use.

Feed your baby before and after shots. Breastfeeding makes most babies drowsy so, they will not notice much pain. Also, after shots it helps to comfort and soothe them.

If your baby is awake at the time of shots, distraction is the key. Talk to them, play with them using a toy or a prop to take their mind off the pain.

After shots, do not apply any kind of heat to the area. Also, avoid massaging that leg for 2 days after shots have been administered.

So, these are some personal suggestions from me to make the vaccination day less dreaded for your baby.

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