[Closed] Baby- reoccurring ear infection

Yep! My son had ear, nose and throat problems for donkey's years. You're welcome to e-mail me. 🙂

hi hora,
11 month old mini FG has had a second ear infection since xmas; although the first one cleared up with the pescribed penicillin within 5 days.
this time he has had a raging temperature that we have been controlling with alternating cowpol and neurofen; and standing outside at 3am with mini fg just in his nappy.
i've had a total of 10 hours sleep since thursday morning. Why does sleep depravation give you a headache

Our youngest has had more ear infections than we can count. Keeping the ear canal dry helps. Don't wash the baby's hair unless it really needs it. Even then, use silicone / waxy ear plugs (good luck getting co-operation) to prevent water ingress. At the pool, use the same plugs and a bathing cap.

The specialist will test for glue ear / fluid build up inside the drum. This is usually caused by an underdeveloped or mishapen eustachian tube, which restricts natural drainage. If fluid is present, they may consider grommets to allow the fluid to drain directly until the eustachian can cope. Don't worry, grommets do work. Also ask for a hearing test, fluid build up can dull the hearing.

After our youngest had grommets fitted, we kept her ears dry as much as possible, infections became a rarity. She is now 4 and no longer requires grommets or antibiotics. We're still careful and continue to use the plugs and cap in the bath / pool.

Good luck.

Unfortunately there isn't a great deal you can do - if it is bacterial then the ABs should clear it up. Of course if it isn't then they won't do anything.

Apparently it has much to do with under-developed passages that are a haven for bugs etc.

We went through a spate of them from about 9 months through to about 18 months (including two ear perforations) but thankfully they have both (seemingly) grown out of them now they are 21 months.

But instead we have had a week of a sickness bug 🙁

EDIT - downshep put it better than I did and we are currently awaiting the appt. to see if our two need grommits too.

Do you take him swimming? Our boy got loads of eye and ear infections at around about one year until we stopped going swimming with him. We also started being scrupulously clean with bathing - cleaning the bath every day, washing facecloths every time, etc. Cleared up once we started doing that, he's fine now.

I used to have ear infections and tonsilitus (sp?) pretty much constantly as a kid. had my tonsils & adenoids (sp? again!) whipped out when I was 11 which pretty much stopped it then

Feel for you (and your little one).

Yes, had same experience with my son (he's now 6yrs old). We went through very similar - except GP referred us to a specialist fairly quickly (any chance you can get your appointment brought forward?)

Grommets installed and as per earlier poster, keep ears dry (silicone plugs) when in bath/shower and then reinforce that with an ear-band (neoprene band around head) when in swimming pool.

After the grommets the number of infections went down significantly (previously it seemed - although probably not in reality - that infections followed constantly). We have very little trouble now with infections, but do continue to take care.

You have my sympathies, and I hope the docs can help you & your family out.

Do you take him swimming? Our boy got loads of eye and ear infections at around about one year until we stopped going swimming with him

It's strange this as my experience also backs this up, but I've no idea how any bugs could survive in swimming pool water that's well maintained (as I assume public ones generally are), it's designed to be a hostile environment. I wonder if it's a secondary infection after little ears are irritated by the chemicals in the water?

Seeing the ENT Registrar now after the GP agreed referred us directly.

hora - ygm. Well done on getting that ENT appointment, that's exactly who you need to see. 🙂

Has he had vaccines recently?

There are recognized links to increased levels of ear infections, and some types even quote it under known effects.

Sorry if that's not much help to you, but just to spread the issue more widely.

Nice bloke as well, shook my hand as we walked in. Gave us a different set of antibiotics but held off injecting a course of antibiotics directly into him and miraculously the little sod sat upright and started playing.

I've had a Migraine from Friday to yesterday pm so have had no sleep/nothing 🙁

Now I need TLC.

Did you ever expect it to be any other way Hora?

I even had to come home from the pub on Saturday night after Evie puked everywhere and my wife was sat up trying to sort two screaming toddlers. Unbelievable ehh?

hora

You might want to check that your child is actually having ear infections.

Our 2 year old has had recurring 'ear infections' since she was small. After numerous visits to the doctors and the Amoxicillin every time my wife ended up talking our daughter to an out of hours doctor who just happened to be an paediatric ear, nose and throat consultant. He said she wasn't actually getting ear infections. Rather, when she got a cold mucus that should have come out of her nose was instead coming out of her ear. He advised that in the short run there isn't much to do, but using saline nose drops would help, and using antibiotic wouldn't help and would likely make things worse.

It seems that this is really comman and the guy my wife saw is on a one-man mission to educate GPs in the South East. He got in contact with our surgery and now they don't give out antibiotics without knowing that a child has an ear infection.

Our daughter still has periods of mucus coming out of her ear when she gets a cold, but often it isn't as bad as before, nor does it seem to be too discomforting (unlike an ear infection).

Crashdummy- his temp spikes upto 39.4 though 🙁

Last night I had him stripped down and wrapped in a cold damp towel.

He actually looked 'happy' 😕

How do you get an ENT appointment that quickly? Is there a way to hurry up the NHS?

Our littlest one is nearly 2, and we noticed a few months ago he wasn't getting on too well with his speech - also had an ear infection around Xmas time which we got antibiotics for. Went to a drop in clinic with a speech therapist a month or so ago and got a proper speech therapy appointment requested (not even heard back about that yet - seems it's months away), along with one for a hearing test. Got the hearing test a week ago, who then referred to ENT given he still has signs of ear infection, maybe other issues, and clearly his hearing isn't up to scratch (though they didn't even complete the test given how his ears look). However having chased, we're told to expect a letter (not an appointment, just a letter telling us when an appointment will be) in 2 weeks time!

ISTM this is a pretty important point in his development - he's now well behind with his speech. Yet he has to wait months to get anything done, months in which he's falling further behind. Am actually getting seriously [s]worried[/s] pissed off with the NHS now 🙁

...got an update, the audiologist did think it was urgent and had put it through as such, and will hopefully chase for us.

aracer - I can totally understand your concerns. It used to be that speech therapists were in short supply and sounds as though it could still be the case.

Have his adenoids been checked, also tonsils and sinuses?

From my son's experience and communication difficulties, I wish we had paid for private speech therapy.

Cheers, cg - I think we'll probably be going the private route, though first need to sort out his hearing. He does seem otherwise pretty bright - though maybe in a different way to his older brother who was a very early talker. He's always been pretty quiet, though you tend to put that down to children being different (and having a noisy older brother) rather than something more fundamental.

So far not really had anything much checked I don't think (don't know the full details as mum has taken him to GP) - just working our way slowly into the system.

A lot of otitis media is viral, there was quite a big study done in AUstralia in the 1990's that looked at antibiotics vs symptom releif, and generally the study showed that fluids & pain & fever releif worked as well & in the same time as antibiotics. AT the hospital that I worked at it changed practice, ie see a pink ear drum, don't immediately go for antibiotics, see how things go.

Obviously though in your case Hora the little fella is suffering quite frequently, so the ENT referral is probably quite appropriate.

Just one query, does anyone smoke near the baby? Babies exposed to smoking are more likely to get OM than non exposed babies.