Pediatric Services in Purchase, NY

At Westchester Park Pediatrics, a sick visit is any medical care your child gets when they feel ill. Most sick visits are related to a sudden, or acute, illness.

Our pediatricians are also experienced in chronic illnesses and can treat your child for any illness related to systemic disease, congenital conditions, or other chronic conditions.

If your child is feeling ill or just hasn’t been acting normal, a sick visit at Westchester Park Pediatrics is a good idea. Some of the many reasons for sick visits include:

• Fever
• Cough
• Sore throat
• Runny nose
• Congestion
• Ear pain
• Muffled hearing
• Rash
• Pain when urinating
• Blood in urine

These symptoms can occur as a result of many conditions, but the common cold, flu, and urinary tract infections (UTIs) are among the most common reasons for sick visits.

If your child has been dealing with symptoms for a day or two and they are worsening or staying the same, call Westchester Park Pediatrics to arrange a sick visit, so they don’t have to suffer any longer.

Westchester Park Pediatrics offers priority appointments for sick patients. Our team doesn’t want your child to be ill any longer than is absolutely necessary, so they will make every effort to work you into the schedule as soon as possible.

Westchester Park Pediatrics is firmly committed to the safety of all patients and team members. To ensure maximum safety, the team conducts sick visits in a different on-site suite than where well visits, like physicals, are conducted.

Team members wear protective surgical masks while conducting sick exams, and they closely follow strict sterilization protocols throughout the office. Both you and your child get a surgical mask to wear when you arrive for the appointment.

The medical team is focused on your child’s health and safety. To make the sick visit a smooth and easy process, they will let you know about any special preparation requirements when you make the appointment.

Immunizations are an essential part of preventive health, protecting you and your family from dangerous diseases. The team at Westchester Park Pediatrics offers a comprehensive range of immunizations for adolescents and young adults.

Immunization is a treatment to protect you from an infectious disease. Immunizations, also known as vaccines, are usually delivered as an injection. They include a diluted amount of a virus to stimulate your immune system.

Immunizations are safe and carefully tested before being released for public use. In addition to protecting your child from disease, vaccines also slow or prevent the spread of illness through communities, which helps protect those who genuinely cannot receive vaccines.

Wondering how vaccines work? A small amount of the virus included in a vaccine imitates infection and triggers your immune system. Your immune system responds to the perceived threat by producing the antibodies necessary to fight off the virus or disease. These antibodies stay in your system, so if you come into contact with those germs in the future, your body is prepared to protect itself.

Most vaccines are provided during childhood to provide lifelong protection, although you may need additional doses of certain vaccines later in life to ensure you maintain the same levels of protection.

The flu vaccine is one notable exception. The flu virus changes rapidly, and each flu season, a different virus sweeps the country. That is why you should have an annual flu shot.

During childhood, your child should receive the following vaccines:

• Tdap
• Meningococcal (Menactra)
• Meningococcal B (Trumenba)
• HPV
• Influenza

In addition to keeping records of your health, with your permission, your doctor can request copies of the records maintained by previous health care providers. Westchester Park Pediatrics offers customized advice on the immunizations your child needs to protect their health.

Call or make an appointment online today to talk to the team at Westchester Park Pediatrics about your child’s immunization needs.

Westchester Park Pediatrics provides preventive health services for children. Our experienced pediatricians recommend comprehensive routine examinations annually to stay on top of your child’s physical and mental health care needs.

Routine examinations are a part of a preventive health care plan and are important for two primary reasons.

These visits ensure that kids are healthy and functioning optimally. They also help the Westchester Park Pediatrics team identify potential health issues in the earliest stages — when treatment is typically most effective.

The Westchester Park Pediatrics team recommends that children undergo a routine exam once a year if they are otherwise healthy. Your child needs this type of exam even when they aren’t sick or experiencing any symptoms.

During a routine exam, one of our physicians will review your child’s personal and family health history. They will discuss any issues your child has experienced since their last visit and perform a physical exam.

As part of the exam, your provider evaluates important aspects of your child’s health, including their:

• Height
• Weight
• Skin health
• Blood pressure
• Body temperature
• Vision and hearing

Depending on your child’s existing health and family history, they may need diagnostic screenings like blood work to check for diabetes and other underlying health conditions.

A routine exam is also an opportunity for your child to receive all necessary immunizations that protect against contagious diseases, like measles, mumps, and the seasonal flu.

Your Westchester Park Pediatrics provider uses your child’s evaluation to review their physical and mental health. In the event they identify potential health issues, your physician can recommend additional testing and treatment services right away.

In addition to proactively caring for your child’s health, the team works with your child to address a variety of issues that have an impact on adolescents, including:

• Peer pressure
• Sports injuries
• Nutrition
• Sexuality
• Birth control
• Irregular periods
• Sexually transmitted disease (STDs)

The Westchester Park Pediatrics team works to build trust and open communication that carries over into your child’s later life. The physicians can also provide comprehensive resources that help your child live a healthy, happy life.

When your child has a plantar wart or other type of wart, it can be irritating, uncomfortable, and embarrassing. The team at Westchester Park Pediatrics in Purchase, New York, offers nonsurgical wart removal for children of all ages.

Wart removal is a simple, painless procedure that kills the infection that causes raised, hard, and flesh-colored or brown growths on your child's skin. Your child may have a single wart, a cluster of warts, or several scattered over their body.

The most common areas for children to have warts are:

• Bottoms of feet
• Between toes or fingers
• Knees or elbows
• On the forehead and cheeks

Warts are common and not a cause for serious concern, but they can be painful, embarrassing, and spread from one child to another. Wart removal can protect your child and others from the infection that lies below the skin's surface.

The team at Westchester Park Pediatrics uses Histofreezer® cryotherapy to remove three main types of warts:

• Plantar warts that typically grow on the soles of the feet
• Simple warts that grow anywhere on the body, especially on the hands and fingers
• Molluscum contagiosum that grow in clusters, anywhere from 2-20

Cryotherapy may also be an effective treatment for flat warts, which grow in larger groups of 20-100 on the face, arms, and legs, and filiform warts, which can grow in long, thin, spiky threads on the face.

Some warts are difficult to eradicate and may return after treatment. In this case, your pediatrician may need to make a small incision and remove the wart surgically.

Histofreezer cryotherapy works by using a specially designed swab tip to apply a freezing agent to the wart. The treatment uses extremely cold temperatures to kill the underlying infection that causes the warts.

Typically, it takes one to four treatments to effectively eliminate warts. Sessions last less than a minute per wart and should be spaced out by two weeks for repeat treatments.

After cryotherapy, the wart turns white and may develop a scab as the infection dies. It is essential that your child doesn't pick or bother the scabs, as doing so could cause a skin infection.

When your child has a build-up of earwax, it can cause hearing problems and prevent effective treatment of ear infections. The team at Westchester Park Pediatrics in Purchase, New York, offers gentle earwax removal to improve and protect your child’s ears and hearing.

Your child may need earwax removal if they have an excessive build-up of earwax in the ear canal. Your pediatrician may recommend earwax removal if they are unable to visualize the eardrum due to excess wax or when the wax is affecting your child's hearing.

The body produces cerumen (earwax) to protect the ear's interior canal and the eardrum from bacteria and foreign objects. Typically, your child's body manages the amount of wax and prevents excessive accumulation.

If the ears don't effectively eliminate the excess, earwax can get packed down and harden, blocking the ear canal and causing earaches, hearing loss, and ringing in the ears.

The staff at Westchester Park Pediatrics use ear lavage to gently remove excessive earwax. This procedure is safe and helps remove wax as well as any foreign objects causing problems.

This process works by using a syringe to place warm water or saline solution into the ear canal. The fluid softens and flushes out the earwax, cleaning the ears.

In most cases, the process isn't painful, though there may be some discomfort if the child's ears are tender or infected.

At Westchester Park Pediatrics, a medical assistant trained to remove earwax safely performs the procedure. Your pediatrician oversees the process and gives instructions and guidance, if needed.

You can avoid the need for earwax removal by helping keep your child's ears clean, dry, and healthy.

Recommendations include:

• Using a dry, clean cloth to wipe around the ears
• Never using cotton swabs to clean your child's ears
• Teaching your child never to put anything in their ears
• Draining their ears after bathing or swimming by tilting their head

If your child puts something inside their ears, resist the urge to put anything in their ear canal to remove it. Make an appointment with your pediatrician as soon as possible to prevent injury or damage to their eardrum.