Gastro-enteritis caused reflux ressurgance in 6 month old?

[Nightfall1983]

DS is 6 months old, when he was 11 weeks old he was diagnosed with (silent) reflux following issues with weight loss/refusing to feed. He was and still is on Gaviscon, Ranitidine and Domperidone. At 13 weeks the cause of this reflux, dairy intolerance was diagnosed and he was put on Neocate formula milk. Very very slowly things improved from there until but about 20 weeks he was eating and gaining weight normally.
BANG, at 26 weeks (on Tues/Weds) he caught a bug and got severe D&V (which DH and I later caught). It was nasty nasty nasty but he is almost over it, no vomitting for over 48 hrs now and the diarrhoea is much reduced, BUT his reflux is back, worse than ever. The symptoms are the same as before: refusing to feed, screaming in pain when we (force) feed him. Writhing in pain and screaming through the day and night (not constantly but still a lot).

I don't know what to do. He is still on his reflux meds which I hope are helping but the doses haven't changed since he was 11 weeks so I think it would help if they were increased (which is ironic because prior to this I was preparing to wean him off them as his reflux was gone) but I know they take a while to build up in his system anyway. I don't have any faith in the GPs, they have never been any use whatsoever with his feeding issues. I really don't want to take him back to a&e, I'm pretty sure he picked up the d&v in a&e after taking him there for a bad allergic reaction to penicillin. We are still under a consultant and I can (and will) call up on Monday for an appointment but I assume it will be weeks as they are very busy.

HELP!

Hmmm. My dd is 12 months and has terrible silent reflux. So bad in fact she is mostly tube fed. I have found that illnesses of any kind set her back.

I'd make sure your DC's meds are right for their weight. Your GP an help calibre as the dosages are standard.

Thanks Ophelia, so sorry to hear about your DD - that must be terrible for you.

I will make an appt with the GP on Monday and see what they say. It's just that what they say always seems to be "wait and see" or "give it another week" even when he is loosing weight and eating less and less each day :( We fought to get 400ml into him yesterday and so far today is no better.

Can I ask if you have any recommendations RE weaning? We haven't started yet, was planning on giving him a go on his half-birthday but he was sick so I haven't - would you recommend waiting till I get the milk back undercontrol or going for it because its another form of calories? I am worried about dehydration with his taking so little milk (won't take water) but if he did start having solids maybe I should consider offering him some juice?

Gastroenteritis can cause a temporary lactose intolerance as the gut heals. Is he still off dairy, or does he have it now?

The only thing that worked for my dd was colief, which replaces the lactase enzyme which is deficient in lactose intolerance. You add it to their bottle, or give them a few drops in expressed milk before a feed it. It is a faff and is expensive, but it worked for us and dd eventually grew out of her symptoms.

Will only be necessary or work if he has lactose in his diet though...

Thanks DrRanj - he is soley on Neocate formula which is lactose free (as well as cows milk protein free which he is normally intolerant to) so I don't think it can be that...

I recommend getting the reflux under control before you do anything. You may end up introducing foods that cause intolerances (mine can't take baby rice!) and that will frankly be a disaster.

If try water. You can buy honey bear straw cups on the Internet which we found invaluable of try using an Evian bottle. A syringe would also work.

My dd is (now!) on Neocate too.

Thanks for the advice. I agree it makes sense not to start weaning until the reflux is under control again (please God).

He won't take water from a syringe - is quite interested in his doidy cup but doesn't really get any down him...