Concerned about bruises

HI.. My son is 20 months and we have been struggling with ITP since mid July. We have been to the Dr's usually twice a week, recently decided to cut back a little, however we are always told if he gets excessive bruising to call, they have never mentioned a certain area where bruises would be more concerning...So here is my question, he has 3 small bruises where his rib cage is??? They are not horrible looking, not puffed out or anything but would this be normal bruising or would the area be more of a concern?? Thank you...

This sounds like it's fine. Generally, if he is a bruiser when his platelets drop he will get a lot of bruises in different parts of his body for no reason. Part of it depends on what his symptoms are when his platelets are low. Is he normally a bleeder? Does he normally just bruise when he's really low or just even moderately low? Or does he even bruise when his platelets are in the like the 50's? It's kind of an overall picture you'd have to look at. But three small bruises would not concern me if he's not generally a bleeder when he's low.

Thank You!! He has only been above 5 3 times and the highest ever was 24, so he bruises all the time he gets petechiae all over usually under 3, but bruises pretty much always, I just get so afraid of missing something

If he's under 5 then only have 3 bruises is pretty good in my book!!

I've had the same questions about bruising. My daughter just turned 6. She was diagnosed at the end of Sept. We had a 0/1 count at diagnosis, so I know what that looks like on her. They would wrap a bp cuff or the stretchy band for a blood draw and she would bruise before our eyes. She didn't respond to IVIG, but did to prednisolone. She has been on medication and they are stepping down her dose gradually. This has led to dealing with up and down counts sometimes, so I asked when should I be concerned, what is normal bruising in an ITP patient? The gist of what I was told was basically no matter how careful we are with them, they still are going to bump into things. This will lead to bruising that will probably look worse on a kid that takes longer for the bleeding to stop. When bruising happens that doesn't have a bump or fall that preceeds it, probably means that the platelet count is low. Petechia is usually a sign that platelets are below a certain count and low. But what is high and low vary with kids, someone who is consistently at 25, would think a 40 was high. Kids that get higher counts would see that same 40 as a low. This is definitely a journey and this board really helps, hang in there everybody.