Excessive vomiting / Reflux

[Notcox]

Can anyone offer some advice?

My 4 month old has been suffering with reflux and excessive vomiting for 7 weeks now - which has progressed into projectile vomiting now. He is being monitered by our GP but as his weight is not dropping massively they have so far decided not to offer him any medication. He vomits 50% of his feeds up directly after a feed and then continues to bring up smaller amounts until his next feed is due.
Friends have babies with similar problems but less severe and their GPs have perscribed Gaviscon - my GP feels that holding off on giving medication is better as putting drugs into babies should be avoided if possible.
Has anyone had experience of this that can give me some advice on managing so much vomit!!?? - I get through 3 changes of clothes a day for him and sometimes me too! And 2 muslim clothes at least per feed - I do alot of washing!!!

xx

See a different gp.

fwiw, my DS had a similar problem and I bought some Gaviscon over the counter . I'm obviously not advising this.

Be careful buying Gaviscon over the counter. Adult Gaviscon and infant Gaviscon are not the same.

Infant Gaviscon is just a food stabiliser. It contains long chain polymers which make the food bind together more in the stomach and more likely go down than up. It has no active ingredients, in the common sense of the word. I would have thought any decent GP should know this. On the other hand, although Gavsicon allows more food to be kept down, it does nothing to alleviate the pain. You need an antacid like ranitidine for that.

I would ask to be referred to a paediatrician if I were you, or make a private appointment if you can afford it. It is wrong to leave a baby in pain if it can be easily avoided.

I bought infant gaviscon not adult gaviscon

I would ask to see a different GP too. My DD has had reflux since 6 days old and she has been on ranitidine since then and it has been a life saver. Has stopped the vommiting completely, she still brings up a lot of clear liquid but we can sort that out with a bib! She is not in pain with it anymore and is like a different baby.

We saw the paed at the hospital where she was admitted for losing weight and bot settling at all. From what I gather there are many campaigns going on to try and get reflux explained a lot more to doctors etc as many don't understand it and the issues it causes. The only thing I can suggest without meds is that if you are BF cut down on the dairy if you can and if you are FF see if you doctor can prescribe dairy free formula as this can also exacerbate the symtoms.

I would try for ranitidine if you can, as I say, it has been a lifesaver and it's not going to be forever, if we had heartburn/indegestion and we were in pain we would have medicine.