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When Rebecca Sutcliffe realized her usual matter-of-fact, ?Time to take your medicine!? approach wasn?t going to work anymore, she didn?t know what to do. Her three-year-old had pink eye and needed drops three times a day for 10 days. ?She cried and said ?no? again and again,? remembers the Winnipeg mom. ?We ended up bribing her with chocolate?she got to have it after the drops, but she could hold it while they went in.?
Whether it?s eye drops, antibiotics, a puffer or just plain Tylenol, giving medicine to a cranky, sick preschooler who?s refusing it can be a stressful, sticky situation. We asked the experts what works.
1. Put kids in charge

?Draw up the dose into a medicine cup or syringe, and then let them decide how much they take at a time, under supervision, until it?s done,? says John Forster-Coull, a pharmacist and dad of two in Victoria. Sutcliffe offers her kids choices: ?Do you want your medicine before you get dressed or after"? 2. Make it playful

Inject some fun by suggesting your kiddo give a favourite stuffed animal a dose of medicine first (use water in an eyedropper, a medicine cup or a syringe), recommends Rod Rassekh, a paediatrician and father of two in Vancouver.
When Rachel Young?s then four-year-old son Benjamin needed to use an inhaler with a spacer (a chamber device with a mask to help him breathe in the medicine) twice a day to treat his asthma, it was initially a rough experience. ?He panicked because he felt like he...