Can someone please explain to me about glue ear?

[minimoonumbertwo]

My son had some manky waxy/gluey/bloody discharge come out of his ear on Monday, I took him to the dr's to diagnosed glue ear & gave him antibiotics. There was no wax on Tues then a bit more bloody wax yesterday (weds) afternoon.

Now i am a little confused as to the glue ear diagnosis as now i have read up on it he hasn't showed any signs of bad hearing & is speaking really well. The nursery were also surprised when i said that's what it was. Is it possible to have mild glue ear? And has the glue now become infected & that's why the wax is bloody?

I am not sure what i should do next - finish the course of antibiotics then take him back to dr's for a check up?

Apologies to those who have really suffered from glue ear, am just trying to get my head round his symptoms matching up to the diagnosis.

Thanks everyone.

btw it's not bothered him at all so don't think there's any pain - would there be pain if it was an infection?

What you have described doesn't really make sense for glue ear unless your son has a perforation of his eardrum.
Glue ear is a problem of the middle ear which is separated form the outer ear by the eardrum so shouldnot cause oozing from the ear unless there is a hole inthe eardrum.

Glue ear can manifest itself in dfferenet ways . dd became very irritable with no physical signs. It was just a residual fluid within the ear which muffled things for her. When it became infected, and the ear drum bulged, she got a temperature etc and had ab's but it lingered during the winter and cleared by spring. Agree dishcarge is not necessarily directly associated unless there is perforation of the ear drum.

Thanks guys - i was thinking maybe perforated ear drum but then wouldn't he have been in pain??

Not necessarily painful. I would suspect perforation . You need to clarify this with the GP .

Glue ear can come and go. So he may have developed it recently. But I agree that oozing shouldn't (or couldn't ) happen without the eardrum rupturing, which can happen with an acute ear infection. You wouldn't need antibiotics for glue ear, so they must be for an infection.

THank you so much for your help, will go back to docs & see what he thinks about perforation. Thanks everyone.