Ear drops in eyes- 18 month old!

[Hellolittlesunshinexxx]

I'm so angry at the moment. Over the weekend I went to the pharmacy to get treatment for my 18 month old conjunctivitis. We were prescribed eye drops and told to use 2 hourly for the first 48 hours then 4 hourly for 4 days.

Fast forward 2 days and the pharmacy calls me saying they think a mistake has been made and that I was prescribed the wrong medicine. They asked me to check and confirmed they were actually ear drops. Advised to get him checked out asap.

Called he Drs who told me to ring at 8am tomorrow. Apparently they had a few emergency appointments today (once I'd directly asked) so I insisted for one of those.

When I've searched online it says that it's really painful and you would soon know something wasn't right due to the pain.

So the last day and a half, my husband and I have held him to put the drops in and he's been crying- clearly in a lot of pain and upset. I'm so angry at everyone at the moment. Mostly myself but the pharmacist as well as the receptionist (she spoke to me like shit).

Thanks for listening if you've got this far!

Did you not read the packaging/ bottle when you got it home before using it? (I'm not excusing their mistake but if you had read the info you wouldn't have used it)

Absolutely should not have happened. I'm not sure how you complain about a pharmacist but I'd be finding out!

However, don't you check the packaging and read the leaflet? Even with dosage instructions from my GP, I always read the packaging and the leaflet. Maybe it's time to start doing that..

My dd gets prescribed eye drops to put in to her ear. They are different strengths and the eye drops are more easily available. May be your Dr prescribed the stronger one? For ours, one is 3% and other is 5% (ear). Call your gp and ask for urgent ring back I would

Have you been to gp yet? Who prescribed the eyedrops, doctor or pharmacist? If the latter they probably were not strong, what advice were you given over the phone?

Not sure if it's relevant but my son sometimes gets prescribed a certain type of eye drop for his ears . It's the only medicine that works so it is a thing to use one for the other

Sounds like pharmacist gave the drops and now they need to see a GP due to wrong drops being dispensed

Maybe eye drops for ears is ok but sounds like ear drops for eyes is not ok

On way to Drs. It says on box ear drops but it's scored out. (I do check boxes but also trust these people usually!!) From what I can gather the eye drops prescribed for ears is ok but the ear drops that are stronger for eyes are really painful.

Its 5% for ears whereas it's 0.5 for eyes.

Will find out more shortly

@dementedpixie I think you're right from what I've been able to quickly gather

I hope your son is ok

I hope he is ok. Good you are going to Doctor’s.

We're home and he seems fine. Eyes are just quite pink.

On the box the sticker says "apply two drops every 2 hours etc" I knew this medication is used as both ear and eye drops but didn't know the dosage is different. For eye drops it should have been 0.5% not 5%. I was told it's probably stung him when its gone in. The GP will ring opthsmology tomorrow and told us to expect to hear back on Wednesday.

@MrsJDornan @Lumene thank you I felt really guilty and angry when I first got the call.