Beat the Heat: Kids at Camp

With temperatures that are predicted to peak at over 100 degrees today, summer camps in the area are bracing for heat.

Village camps already are gearing-up for the weather, changing schedules, forbidding outdoor sports activities and keeping kids lathered in sunblock (they recommend SPF 50). However, according to St. John's Riverside Hospital's emergency room director Mark Silberman, there are some lesser-known rules that should be on all child-care providers' radars.

"Everyone knows it's good to keep hydrated, but they don't lways know with what," Silberman said. "Sports drinks such as Gatorade are better because they contain electrolytes. People lose salt when they sweat."

Though all health and childcare professionals agree on increased fluid intake, there are discrepancies in the types of drinks they recommend.

"I tell parents to give kids lots of filtered water," Penelope Gay Sheeley, a holistic pediatrician who runs the practice Well Child in Dobbs Ferry.  "I always try to avoid food ad drinks with artificial flavors and toxins."

In terms of balancing electrolytes, Sheeley says kids should be encouraged to eat more fresh fruit.

Camp directors suggest parents send kids  to camp equipped with more than one water bottle and wear light-colored clothes, which trap less heat.

"We are planning to keep the kids inside today when they're not in the water," Lisa O'reilly of Hastings Village Day Camps said. "We had planned a water slide activity for today."

Both O'Reilly and Katie MaCallum, director of the Oasis Day Camp at Mercy College in Dobbs Ferry,  stressed the number of water breaks kids would be encouraged to take throughout the week.

"We even have little games, such as 'Who can drink a cup the fastest?'" MacCallum said.

But Silberman warned parents and counselors to let kids know they can take in too much water as well.

"If your sodium levels have dropped too low and you take in excessive water, that can also pose serious health risks," Silberman said. He suggested making sure kids stay hydrated throughout the day and avoid vigorous activities.

O'Reilly trains her counselors to recognize the initial signs of overheating--such as: red face, sweating and white around the gums and pale lips--but insisted that preventative measures have thus far kept kids from succumbing to heat exhaustion.

"It's hard because the fourth to sixth-grade boys are really on a soccer kick," she said. "But we steer them away from those types of activities."

MacCallum agreed that kids often "don't have the greatest internal registers of when they're getting too hot"—which is why, she said, counselors try to put the kibosh on physical activity in the sun before it's too late. 

Silberman suggests kids be taken inside or sprayed with water when experiencing the early signs of heat exhaustion, but if their temperatures do not come down, he urges camps and parents to take them directly to the emergency room.

"In its severest form, heat stroke can be fatal," Silberman said. "It's important to take it very seriously."

Though both Oasis and Hastings recreation camps have certified nurses or EMT's on campus, neither has treated a camper for heat exhaustion this season.

"With overwhelming heat like we have today and yesterday everyone's really cautious, so we tend to be fine," MacCallum said  "It's when it gets cooler that you see more incidences of dehydration because kids forget to drink."