Ranitidine or infant gaviscon?

[notsureifimbeingur]

Hello, I have a 5 week old DD.
I am convinced she has silent reflux, and the doctor agrees and has prescribed infant gaviscon.

She arches her back when feeding, screams halfway through/after feeds, won’t be calmed, feeds constantly it seems, has a grunting cough, and other signs pointing to silent reflux, and only brings up milk very rarely. As soon as we give gaviscon she stops crying instantly and usually goes to sleep soon after.

The doctor told us to continue to use Infant gaviscon for a while to see how we get on, and if needed we could then get Ranitidine at a later date. We have been using gaviscon for almost 2 weeks now.

I am finding that my Dd needs about 4 out of the recommended 6 sachets a day, and is becoming constipated, but the gaviscon is working. The doctor was reluctant to give us ranitidine as it was a stronger medicine.

My question is do I now move on to ranitidine or continue to use gaviscon because it is working (albeit giving her constipation?)

thanks for your advice, and any stories of using these medicines would be appreciated,

Gaviscon really helped for my daughter aswell. I would continue using it if she is doing well with it.

Ranitidine works differently to gaviscon, so if the gaviscon is working, I'd be inclined to stick to it. Are you BF or FF?

Thank you for your replies. I am bf.
yes it is working, although it is a major hassle to have to make it up when she is screaming in pain. As you can’t make it up in advance. And it is giving her constipation.

Can you please tell me in what way does ranitidine work differently?

It reduces the acid levels whereas the gaviscon creates a barrier, IIRC? (my youngest refluxer is now 3yo!)

The ranitidine has to be given 3x a day, very evenly spaced out or the pain breaks through. It doesn't stop the reflux, just takes the acidic pain away. It's also a pain to give to babies, as the syrup tastes like menthol cigarettes rather than a fruity sweet one. Also, as your baby grows, you need to adjust the dose regularly based on weight - more medicine to force in and more doctor visits.

My DD was BF, on ranitidine and only pooped once a week. The paediatrician was not concerned about that - it's apparently normal for BF babies.

Thank you that is really helpful to know all this.
How annoying that it doesn’t taste good for babies, you would think they would make it taste nice!
My DD usually has between 5-7 dirty nappies a day and has gone down to 0/1 a day on gaviscon. I really don’t know what to do regarding trying Ranitidine.

I think it depends how much the constipation is upsetting your baby? When we first tried gaviscon with my DD (about 5 weeks) she went from 6 poos a day to 1...
But she wasn’t in any pain or discomfort so we took that as a helpful thing rather than a negative side effect! Also, babies can change how frequently they poo quite often for no reason at all.
If your baby is happy and not in pain then stick with the gaviscon. If it’s causing pain, try the ranitidine. You can always go back to gaviscon if necessary.
Good luck :)

Also, I assume weight gain is now adequate? If not putting on enough weight on gaviscon then definitely try ranitidine.

And for what it’s worth my daughter loves the taste of the ranitidine haha

The Health visitor is coming out tomorrow so I will find out about weight gain then, and I will speak to her about Ranitidine.
My DD doesn’t appear to be in any pain, apart from when she is screaming just before we give the gaviscon and then she calm instantly. But seems like she is in no pain regarding constipation, it’s just me that’s concerned about lack of poos!!

Thank you for all your replies.

Sorry only other thing to add... neither gaviscon or ranitidine (even high dose) really helped my DDs silent reflux... the only thing that did was antireflux formula milk

Ds got very constipated on infant gaviscon so we did move successfully to ranitidine after a couple of weeks. He took it quite happily and it sorted his pain.

My DD got very constipated on Gaviscon and was switched to ranitidine which has done her the world of good!

Gaviscon alone didn't help my DD, so she also had ranitidine and domperidone. Vomiting up more solid milk was pretty grim, and was causing her to choke during the night (6 weeks prem so she was only 5lb when we started medication).

The domperidone speeds up the movement of food through the body which seemed to offset the constipation a bit too.

The ranitidine reduces the amount of stomach acid produced, the idea being if the gaviscon isn't keeping milk down then at least it won't hurt as much coming back up.

Given the gaviscon is working, and it's the constipation you are concerned about, I'd stick with it or ask the GP about domperidone rather than ranitidine.

It doesn't stop the reflux, just takes the acidic pain away.

That's not quite right. As DropZoneOne mentioned above, it reduces the amount of stomach acid produced therefore reducing both the reflux itself and the pain it causes. My DS is evidence of this, as he puked constantly and within two hours of being given ranitidine it stopped, like someone had flicked a switch.