Kids' bodies do not adapt to hot weather (above 95 degrees F/35 degrees C, and/or high humidity) as well as adults do. Teens are somewhere in the middle. To prevent heat stress and dehydration in your child or teen, follow this advice from the American Academy of Pediatrics, and make sure your child's coaches and counselors are following it too.
- For activities lasting 15 minutes or more (such as sports practices or games, or outdoor summer camp activities), reduce intensity levels when heat or humidity is high.
- If kids are starting a new, strenuous exercise program (say, football practice begins for the year) or have just traveled to a warm climate, they need to acclimate slowly. Limit the intensity and duration of exercise and gradually increase it over 10 to 14 days.
- Before prolonged physical activity, kids should be well-hydrated. During the activity, kids should take frequent water breaks. A child weighing 90 pounds needs 5 ounces of cold tap water or a flavored sports drink every 20 minutes, even if he does not feel thirsty.
- Clothing should be light-colored and lightweight and limited to one layer of absorbent material to help sweat evaporate. Sweat-saturated shirts should be replaced by dry clothing.
- Practices and games played in the heat should be shortened and more frequent water/hydration breaks should be instituted.
Source: American Academy of Pediatrics, Committee on Sports Medicine and Fitness: Climatic Heat Stress and the Exercising Child and Adolescent. Pediatrics Vol. 106 No. 1 July 2000; reaffirmed September 2007.
