I am journeying overseas to adopt Internationally. I will hopefully be
taking my toddler and adolescent on this trip. What can I do to ensure a
healthy and enjoyable trip for my family?
International travel, with the entire family unit has become a growing
trend among potentially adoptive families. Some see this trip as a means
to create a new family while bringing the old family unit closer
together. While International travel can be a very stressful endeavor,
it can also prove to be a life-enriching experience that you may never
have had the occasion to encounter if it was not for International
Adoption.
People travel great lengths to Russia, China, Africa, Guatemala, and
Columbia to formally adopt a child. Some families are fortunate to be
assigned industrialized cities like Moscow, while others need to go the
periphery of Russia to finalize their adoption. More concerning are the
groups that voyage to developing nations. In developing countries, there
is a shortage of health care, poor sanitary conditions; and where
infectious diseases run rampant should be of significant concern to any
educated traveler.
Parents need to plan their International travel accordingly. It would be
wise to have a conference a local authority on International travel at
least two months before the anticipated travel date. Time is needed to
attain an immune response to the advocated vaccinations. Sometimes
prophylactic medications may also be required during the trip.
As a group, young children have significant difficulty tolerating
extreme heat, dehydration and reduced nutritional intake. It is because
of the child's decrease in reserve, why parents need to carefully
prepare in order to be able to identify the signs of medical problem
should they arise, and understand how to deal with it accordingly.
Infants in general are more prone to become ill during their trip
because of their immature immune system and sometimes-deficient primary
vaccination series. From the aspect of adolescents and teenagers, other
health and social concerns appear. Because parents may be very busy with
their International adoption proceedings, appropriate, consistent and
continuous supervision of the teenager may unintentionally be reduced.
Adolescents may have opportunities to participate in potentially risky
activities such as drug, alcohol, sex and travel in unsafe motor
vehicles. As a parent, it is imperative to be knowledgeable of these
hazardous behaviors and speak to your youngster frankly with regard to
how to deal with them should the event invariably arise.
In order to virtually guarantee a healthy trip for you and you
household, good weekend plans on behalf of the parent is strongly
suggested. Below is a list of appropriate things to you should
thoroughly review prior to embarking on an International trip,
particularly if journeying to a developing country.
Tips before you travel:.
1) Review health insurance benefits. Investigate if your plan furnishes
coverage to you while you are overseas. Sometimes it may be in your
families best interests to obtain supplemental health coverage while
traveling should a medical need arise.
2) Evacuation insurance should a medical emergency appear and a family
member needs to be airlifted to another country for medical management.
3) Locate the names and telephone numbers of travel clinics in the
country that you will be visiting.
4) Parents need to record the telephone numbers of all the household
members physicians and pediatricians.
5) Make sure that you children's vaccine status is up-to-date and obtain
any special vaccines as indicated by the particular country. A brief
visit to a travel Clinic will aid to determine if you require any
particular country specific vaccines, such as Typhoid, Hepatitis A,
Rabies, Encephalitis.
Tips for preventative care of children while traveling:.
1) Provide sufficient entertainment and distractions to effectively keep
your child occupied for the duration of the entire plane flight. A
portables DVD player, game boy, books, puzzles or their favorite toy are
sufficient to keep even the most mischievous youngster busy.
2) Sedation in most instances is not required for overnight travel, but
for children greater than 2 years of age, a parent may choose to
administer Benadryl to help the child sleep. It is very important you
try a trial dose a few days prior. All children are different, and can
metabolize the medicine differently. Some children may have a
paradoxical response, and instead of becoming sleepy, become hyperactive
and restless.
3) Changes in cabin pressure can have a painful impact on a child's
inner ear. Generally, the act of swallowing, drinking from a bottle can
aid with pressure equalization.
4) Make sure that the child is adequately hydrated during the air
travel. Insensible fluid loss happens in flight and can cause dryness of
the child's mucous membranes. They are not dehydrated however.
5) Try not to overfeed infants because the higher altitudes occasionally
cause the stomach gasses to increase and children may encounter tummy
distention and physical pain.
During your international trip abroad:
While traveling, particularly to a developing country, the prevention of
infectious disease is of the utmost importance. The most common
intestinal problem encountered in tourists can be avoided if simple
hygiene procedures are followed. Simple hand washing and the avoidance
of unsafe foods can avert clinical illness.
Good hygiene is essential to the avoidance of gastrointestinal
infections, which are in most cases transmitted via the fecal-oral
route. Washing with soap and water, or the appropriate use of
antibacterial hand wash is sufficient to furnish protection. When
traveling abroad, especially after visiting the orphanages, siblings may
find themselves playing with some of the children, on the ground, with
dirty toys. Special attention before eating in regards to hand washing
before meals is now imperative.
Choosing safe foods for you and your children during your voyage can
become a full time job. Getting children to eat in general is a
difficult task, introducing a different cuisine to their diet can make
it even more challenging. Water is the most common vector for the
transmission of illness. Travelers, particularly to developing nations
should effectively avoid the consumption of the local tap water. When
dealing with children, parents should be on the lookout for juices mixed
with tap water, ice cubes, and even when brushing your child's teeth
with water should be avoided. Families should automatically make it a
practice of consuming only bottled water. Make sure that the bottle is
sealed because sometimes-unscrupulous vendors might recycle old bottles
and stock them with tap water, and successfully sell it to the unknowing
traveler. If bottled water is not available, then boiling the water is
regarded safe before consumption.
Often foods that are unsafe for consumption can be detected without too
much difficulty.
Below is a list of unsafe food and drinks.
1) Uncooked fruits or vegetables from which the outer skin have not been
removed.
2) Undercooked meats or seafood.
3) Fruit drinks and frozen popsicles
4) Any food washed with water should be cooked before consumption. Milk
should be avoided unless it is pasteurized.
Unsafe foods can come in mysterious packages:.
1) Sandwiches that have been topped with lettuce or tomatoes
2) Fruits that have been skinned at outdoor markets (mangos, pineapples,
papaya) are often dipped in water to retain them moist.
Food and snacks at the local market can seem appealing to your children.
Parents should be prepared by traveling with know safe snacks in order
to prevent purchasing contaminated snacks for your children.
Safety and injury prevention :
Advise about safety and injury prevention during your adoption journey,
is along the lines of the anticipatory guidance that one would receive
during your well childcare visits with your pediatrician. Accidental
injury is the leading cause or death in children that travel
internationally. Standard safety measures and extra common sense during
your voyage can aid to reduce the potential risk of accidental injury.
Seat belt safety while traveling in vehicles is still the most important
means of preventing accidental death in children. Unfortunately, seat
belts may not consistently be available in the automobiles that they
will be traveling in during their adoption journey. In cases when there
is no seatbelt in the automobile, carefully positioning the child
traveler in the rear seat is safer than in the front seat.
Unless you are staying at the local Hilton 5 star hotel, the physical
environment can be more dangerous than some families realize. Children
are explores by nature and are guaranteed to detect potential dangers
before the parents do. Unfortunately, when this happens, it is generally
too late. Parents should inspect the child's environment during their
travel continuously. They should watch for exposed electrical wires and
outlets, and broken glass. Some of the building that you may visit may
be older type, with decaying construction, inadequate guardrails and
lack of window guards.
The most devastating feeling that a parent can experience is when they
turn around and they no longer see their child. Children can become
accidentally separated from their families during their adoption
journey. The commotion of visiting the orphanage, conversing with
facilitators doctors and successfully completing millions of forms, can
lessen the parents supervision of their other children. It takes just a
split second for your naive child to get lost. Personal information,
containing the child's name, address where the child's family are
staying and contact telephone numbers should be put into the child's
pocket. It should never be displayed in plain view.
Protection against insects pertains to traveler to developing countries.
Mosquitoes can frequently transport life-threatening illness such as
Malaria, dengue, Filariasis and Japanese encephalitis. Barrier
protection with sufficient clothing cover-up, protective nets and
personal insecticides are essential to preventing exposures to such
diseases.
Your adoption journey should be a memorable experience for you and your
family. Careful preparation and extensive guidance before you travel can
effectively make this trip an enjoyable event, and not a remembrance
laden with medical illness, hospitals and physicians.

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