If you’ve heard about the rhinovirus and wondered what it is, Dr. David Karas, pediatrician at Akron Children’s Pediatrics, Wadsworth, explains.
What is rhinovirus?
Rhinovirus is one of the most frequent causes of the common cold. There are many viruses that can cause colds and rhinovirus is one that we see frequently during the fall and winter. Typical symptoms will include fever, cough, runny nose. Usually the worst of it lasts three or four days, but many kids may have symptoms lasting long as nine or 10 days.
What are treatments for rhinovirus?
Unfortunately there’s not a lot of great treatments for the chronic cold, but we can certainly keep kids comfortable. It’s important to encourage lots of fluids. Tylenol or ibuprofen can be helpful if kids are having any pain or discomfort. A vaporizer in the room can be helpful and certainly a teaspoon of honey can be very helpful for cough in kids that are over a year of age.
What are symptoms of rhinovirus?
There are other viral infections that can cause very similar symptoms such as COVID. We certainly encourage anyone with cough or cold symptoms to get tested for COVID. The symptoms can be exactly the same and we certainly don’t want kids taking COVID to school.
