Reflux support thread - sorry if there is one already, I couldn't find one. I'm having a nightmare - both me and baby crying!!

[zambooloo]

So last week my 11 wk old dd was diagnosed with reflux. Gaviscon just made her really constipated so we changed to domperidone and zantac (ranitadine) and had a couple of quite good days. However it has all gone wrong again now! She is so hungry but so sad - she is in real pain and can't feed. I'm waiting for call back from dr.

Sorry to hear things went wrong again. It is dreadful when they are in pain and you can't do anything about it.

How long has she been on the domperidone and ranitidine? With DD1 and DD2, it took about a week to really make a difference. Plus both were on the maximum amount of ranitidine for their weight. DD1 was originally put on the smallest dose and it was gradually upped until she was ok.

Are you bfing? Have you thought about cutting out things like dairy, soya, gluten, tomatoes? Are you doing all the things like keeping her upright, putting her cot at an angle, feeding as upright as possible, feeding while she is sleepy?

Thanks for response, she started them on friday so maybe I need to be more patient! Just that we had quite a good couple of days so I started to feel more optimistic and now she is in pain again :(

Formula feeding - is it common for reflux to be caused by an intolerance?

We are doing all the things you've suggested - does it help to feed little and often? I'm wondering whether to try half feeds every couple of hours?

Hi, I have lots of sympathy for you, my ds has struggled with reflux too.

We stuck with gaviscon and in our case luckily his constipation settled. He is still on the max dose now he is 6mo and I expect to have to continue treatment until he is no longer having large volumes of liquid. Reflux is caused by the muscle sphincter at the top of the stomach being weak so the acidic stomach contents come back up. It isn't caused by intolerances but you can feel like you need to try everything to try to help. As they get older the muscle develops fully and the problem settles.

Feeding little and often certainly helped us, I was bfing and felt like I was constantly feeding until he was about 4 months. The gaviscon seemed to take ages to make a difference- at least 2 weeks until the full effect- I wonder if it might be the same for other treatments? We tried reducing it a couple of weeks ago to see if all had settled but it had not... hello square one.

Sounds like you are doing everything right, stick with it and don't hesitate to go back to your GP if it not settling, there are other meds to try.

There is some evidence that reflux can be caused by food intollerances, but other evidence points to an immature gut including what Upside said. For DD2 she is definitely better on a dairy/soya free diet, but hopefully as her gut matures she'll be able to tolerate those things better.

I don't know about FF, but it would probably be worth trying feeding little and often. There are also hypoallergenic formulas that you might want to try. But I think it is worth hanging on with what you are doing for another few days - maybe try to get a doctors appointment on Friday or Monday. Then if things are better you can cancel, but if they aren't right you are already doing something.

Good luck.

aww reflux is shit

are you ff, sma staydown was great for dd. its a lot thicker so a bit harder to bring back up. dd was on domperidone and ranitidine as well.

if you are not happy with what the dr's say, take your dd to a&e.

My DS had silent reflux as a small baby and we tried lots of different things in order to help him. He was on Gaviscon, then Domperidone and Ranitadine and the paediatrician told us that it can take two to three weeks for them to work effectively. We elevated the head of his cot slightly, burped him mid-feed AND pos-feed and kept him in an upright position for 20-30 minutes after each feed. We also found switching to Dr Brown's bottles made an enormous difference. By six months, it all settled down and I was able to stop giving him the meds.