First or Last to Find Out About Fifth Disease?

Pink cheeks. That was the first hint that anything was amiss. Despite the gorgeous late Spring weather and the amount of recess time spent outdoors, the pink cheeks that would normally merit no more than a passing glance, made us look twice. Having given birth to three very fair-haired, fair-skinned children, the daily application of sunscreen at our home is as normal as the daily application of clean underwear. So, pink cheeks? Curious.

Three days later, after an outing to the Zoo, curiosity quickly turned to concern. Not only did our seven year old look sunburned, her face looked like she had been smacked repeatedly -- red, white, blotchy. She looked ill, but swore she felt just fine, a fact bore out by the absence of a fever and the presence of her good humor and abundant energy. OK, we thought, file this under "Keep An Eye on It".

That filing lasted approximately twelve hours.

When she awoke for school the next morning, we were horrified. In addition to the bright red face, she now sported a red and white mottled rash on both arms and legs. The rash itself was like none we had seen or treated before. Sure, we were more than familiar with diaper rash, prickly heat, heat rash and chicken pox, but this was new. Her skin was totally smooth, no bumps, lesions or eruptions -- and she was not extremely itchy.

As it was too early to call the pediatrician, I headed to the millennium’s next best source of medical information -- the Internet. I surfed for every rash related ailment I could think of, from psoriasis to scarlet fever. I was able to quickly rule out a vast number of rashes based on their descriptions and symptoms. Growing more frustrated by each fruitless click of the mouse, I finally struck gold at HealthlinkUSA.com. While their search engine pulled up a large list of many of the same items I had already surfed, there in the middle of the page I noticed the term "fifth disease".

Out of curiosity, I clicked on the link and began to read. Thirty seconds later, I had my diagnosis. Kendall had contracted a startlingly common virus, yet somehow my husband and I had never heard of it. I would soon learn that what was more common was that we were not alone.

Medical name: Erythema Infectiosum, slang name: Slap Face. Fifth disease is so named for being the fifth rash disease identified and described by physicians prior to the advent of modern vaccinations, rubella, measles, scarlet fever and roseola being the first four. In stark contrast to this quad of more serious and debilitating rash diseases, fifth, while alarming in view, is, on the whole, benign.