Swallowing Pills

Also: Blowing Noses

Children as young as age 4 can be taught to swallow pills, allowing them to use (dose appropriate) adult-style coated tablets or capsules of acetaminophen and ibuprofen.

For dosages, you will need to convert their weight based dose from liquid to solid, and you may need to cut tablets in half to get the correct dose.

The basic approach to teaching pill swallowing involves using increasingly larger candies until you reach those that match the size of a tablet or capsule.  I.e. Sprinkles, then Nerds, mini M&Ms and finally M&Ms or Skittles.  Here is a great video with some enhancements to the technique to make swallowing even easier.

Some extra fun for the younger set – teach your kids how to blow their nose with this fun game using cotton balls or pom poms:

  1. Blow a pom pom across the table with their mouth open.
  2. Blow a pom pom across the table with nose open but mouth closed.
  3. And finally, blow the pom pom with mouth closed and one side of the nose compressed: video here.