Decongestants

As a group of medications, decongestants are supposed to decrease mucous secretions and decrease vascular swelling in the nose that causes the nose to get stuffy and snotty. The truth is that most decongestants for kids just make them sleepy so they complain less and sleep more while they are feeling crummy. The effectiveness of any kiddo decongestant is marginal at best. Prior to age 6, the best decongestant is all the old-school stuff: nasal saline and steamy bathrooms to help inject moisture into the snot to make it easier to come out and calm down inflammation in the upper airways. After age 6, there are a lot of decongestants on the market such as kids’ Mucinex and Dimetapp. Again, their effect over placebo in randomized control trials is negligible. Tincture of time and the old-school saline nose sprays and warm water vapors do the trick better than anything.