Diarrhoea in 11 month old

[Flowerface]

DD has major diarrhoa and has been off her food almost completely for five days now. I am starting to feel a bit panicked that I haven't been taking it seriously enough and seen a doctor - I had consoled myself with the fact that she was still quite lively and energetic. But she has quite a lot of weight and I am starting to freak out a bit.

So - should I take her to the out of hours doctor tomorrow? What could they do? And any suggestions for what I could do to make it better?

I don't think she is dehydrated - wet nappies and she's taking breastmilk, water and some formula...

Thanks for you help! Why do these panics always strike at the weekend!?

If she's not dehydrated, stop trying to give her anything but breastmilk and water. Avoid formula, it is not your friend when you have a tummy upset.

If you do this for 24 hours, things should abate. Don't panic btw, as long as she's still drinking she'll be okay for a while yet. :)

Thanks. The formula isn't ideal, especially as she doesn't usually have it. But she was doing v well on solids, so I don't have much breastmilk left - not enough to cope with events like these! Is five days an unnaturally long time for something like this?

Not really if you are continually trying to give her food or cow's milk products!

If you nurse her really often for 24 hours your milk supplies will come back very quickly and she'll turn a corner I'm sure :)

Sorry that wasn't very clear, her stomach and bowels need to rest and not to be processing a lot of irritants, milk is especially irritating after diarrhea. Quite often children develop a short term allergy to it - so that when they have it, the pooping kicks off again :(

Signs to look out for include, unresponsiveness, dehydration, lethargy, laboured breathing etc.

I would not worry unnecessarily if she was living on just breastmilk for a week. Any longer than that needs checking but she will not come to harm for that short a period. If it goes on, by all means go to the GP on Monday, but there may be very little that can be done.

You may want to try rehydration salt pouches (from any pharmacy) too.

Sorry to disagree with chocolate, but the national institute for clinical excellence dont recomment stopping any foodstuff apart from fizzy drinks and pure fruit juice. DD will have diarrhoea 5-7 days whatever you do. They recommend rice, pasta, carby type stuff that is easy to digest. Milk etc is not forbidden either. Rehydration drinks are ideal (taste foul!)
If children eat a light diet they will have more energy and there is also a lot of fluid in food. I suppose if you find milk or any particular foodstuff gives her tummy ache then you should probably avoid it. Read this, it tells you everything and is evidence based. Also danger signs are flagged:-
www.nice.org.uk/nicemedia/live/11846/43843/43843.pdf
It used to be stop food and milk but now the experts have swung the other way. In a few years it'll be back to starving!