Taytee

Nessia

I have a nurse question for you. Mia's had cold/cough/congestion all week. Law grade fever one morning, under 101. Tonight she's complaining of her head hurting and the back of her neck hurting. You think she needs to see a dr tomorrow? Maybe becoming sinus infection. She doesn't have her tonsils or adenoids anymore so thinking it wouldn't be strep. She just never complains of headaches so I'm not sure if that's normal. 

Taytee

There's lots of stuff that can cause headache and sore neck, it may be unrelated to the other recent illness. If the headache persists tomorrow or returns immediately after Motrin wears off, then yeah, she should see a doctor because that's a sign of sinus pressure.

As a disclaimer, with neck pain and HA, one always worries about Meningitis, so here's a comprehensive guide to what to look for and when to worry.

https://www.askdrsears.com/topics/childhood-illnesses/meningitis

With respect to the stiff neck, sometimes children with meningitis will not look side to side. They turn their entire body as if in a neck brace. But it's not the side to side that's the most telling but rather flexing the head onto the chest and having it be very painful and severely restricted.

From wiki - "Nuchal rigidity occurs in 70% of adult cases of bacterial meningitis.^[6] Other signs of meningism include the presence of positive Kernig's sign or Brudzinski's sign. Kernig's sign is assessed with the patient lying supine, with the hip and knee flexed to 90 degrees. In a patient with a positive Kernig's sign, pain limits passive extension of the knee. A positive Brudzinski's sign occurs when flexion of the neck causes involuntary flexion of the knee and hip. Although Kernig's and Brudzinski's signs are both commonly used to screen for meningitis, the sensitivity of these tests is limited.^[6][8] They do, however, have very good specificity for meningitis: the signs rarely occur in other diseases.^[6] Another test, known as the "jolt accentuation maneuver" helps determine whether meningitis is present in patients reporting fever and headache. The patient is told to rapidly rotate his or her head horizontally; if this does not make the headache worse, meningitis is unlikely.^[6]"

Overall I'd say she's at pretty low risk unless she gets another fever. If she does, you can feel confident giving her both Motrin and Tylenol before going to the ER.