Ear infection in small babies- would you always give anti-b?

[Mrscarrot]

My 20 week old was up screaming for over three hours on Monday, first time he's cried in the night (he wakes up for feeds but doesn't cry)
so I knew something was wrong.

Gp said an infection in one ear but mild, see how he goes in two days.

This morning seemed ok so didn't ring up but he had a big screaming patch this afternoon, took him back and they said as it's still infected two days later, better give him anti-biotics.

I collected them but haven't given them yet as I'm really anxious about the link to allergies. Dd had asthma as a baby, and lo is already showing symptoms of allergy, wheeziness, watery eyes, cough etc, so I don't want to make it worse.

here

On one hand, ears often clear up themselves and its better to avoid AB if at all possible, especially they're allergic types

on the other hand they're bloody painful and there have been links to glue ear with untreated infections.

Feeling very stressed about it, any advice?

perhaps I should have been a bit clearer. An ear infection is likely to make the drum read and inflamed. I don't know if an ear thermometer can detect that if there isn't a general rise in temperature or before that general rise in apparent but I think it might do.

My son was on AB's constantly for around 6 months for repeated ear infections. Eventually we got advice from a friend who's a microbiologist, who told us to stop them and take him to a nutritionist. She took him off cow's dairy products and he went on to goat's formula and goat's dairy products. He was around 14 months old at the time.

It worked a treat and it stopped the ear infection/AB cycle that he'd got into. We reintroduced cow's dairy products after about 18 months with no ill effects.

As a result of this the hubby and I were dead against AB's for ear infections. So, when my daughter got a bad infection, I left it for a couple of days after she had a discharge from her ear, as apart from the discharge, she seemed so much happier. My GP gently told me off when he saw her and said that it's vital to see a GP and get AB's if the eardrum perforates, as it's possible for an infection to travel into the brain, once the eardrum is open.

We now have the rule that we let an ear infection run its course, but if there is real distress on the children's part and therefore some risk that the eardrum will perforate, we go to the GP and accept AB's. She's had one more burst eardrum, but we've managed to avoid repeated ear infections like we had with our son.

We also treat the children with a warmed very dilute tea tree oil/carrier oil solution in the ear at the first signs of an infection. We've had reasonable success with this.

Hope this helps
artyharry