Infant Gaviscon dosage - 6 weeks

[Mrbumpoid]

My daughter is 6 weeks old and has reflux.

The dr prescribed Gaviscon and said TWO sachets per EVERY feed. If it causes constipation then come back in two days for another medicine.

One day later, looks like the start of constipation. Different dr said NO NO that's way too much. HALF a sachet every OTHER feed. She also said they don't like to prescribe anything stronger.

1. How can they be THAT contradictory?!

2. Which dosage should I go with??

Bump

How much does your baby weigh? You can give one or two when required but the maximum you can give a day depends on weight.

When my 2 was on it I was told 1 sachet per 4oz feed no more then 6 sachets a day that's going back 9 and 2 years ago.
It might be best to ask a chemist though and see what they say.
DD3 had reflux really badly and there was a shortage of infant gaviscon at the time and it was suggested that anti reflux milk would be a good idea. It has carobel in it and when the gaviscon didn't work we was prescribed that with rantidine which worked better for her.
I hope it gets sorted for you both reflux.

@Jimjamjooney 11lbs, 12 oz

Theoretically (according to the BNF for children) your DD can have 2 sachets with feeds with a maximum of 12 sachets a day, BUT it depends on the severity of her reflux. You really need confirmation from your Dr/ a pharmacist to query it for you.

Our dose was half a sachet, but she was about half the weight of your DD. Two sounds way too much, even on our dose she had terrible constipation, is quite common side effect but is apparently the simplest/cheapest thing to try kids on first. I stopped it after a couple of days as that was giving her even more pain, and asked to try ranitidine. Took a while to get dose right (better once we'd been referred to paediatrician), but she is so much better on it. Do ask for it, and/or paediatric referral, is not a 'strong' medication as your gp inferred, just works in a different way. Good luck, reflux is horrible, both for baby and you, made those first few months very tough for us 💐

I done one sachet per 4-5oz bottle but it didnt work for us and i was scared of the constipation side effect as heard it could be so bad!
Carobel to thicken the milk was ten times better

@5tarlight we have started on ranitidine! They said 0.3 three times a day. When did you give it to the baby? We put first syringe dose down her throat before milk. But then reflux brought milk up so I’m wondering if she also brought the ranitidine up. So perhaps we will not do it with a feed

Ah great! Yeah can be a vicious circle trying to get meds in... Tends not to be directly before a feed for us (that does seem to mean slightly more chance of coming back up) and not straight after either, but we really don't have a set routine, just whenever we get a chance for those 3 times a day (ideally if she's calm but I know that's not always possible at 6 weeks!) Keep her sat up for 10 mins or so to help stop it coming straight back out, but sometimes it does despite best efforts 🙂
Probably need a few days/week to kick in, see how you go. If no joy you may find you need to go back to Dr to up the dose. We started 0.3, then went to 0.6 and now on 1ml. Obviously the ranitidine doesn't stop the sick but should ease the discomfort from the acid which is the main issue.

As pps have said carobel may also be a good thing to try. As I mainly Bf and can't express really, we couldn't try this ourselves, but we do give her a bottle of formula in the evening (originally started to give me a little rest as she was a very frequent feeder and i was getting no sleep in the early weeks, but we've kept going with it) - we switched this to an anti reflux version which does seem to help with less throw up at night. It does change her poos, but just being once a day didn't cause her constipation. Not sure how it would be doing every feed though.

A lot of it is trial and error as you are probably already finding! We are at 5 months now and whilst we still have some issues, she is like a different baby compared to where we started. Good luck and hope she starts feeling better soon.