Pain in ear - crying with pain

[Fel1x]

DS1 is 4.5yo, he has high pain tolerance and rarely complains about illness/pain ever.
About 7pm he suddenly started crying about pain inside his ear. It got worse by bedtime and he couldnt sit still long enough to listen to the bedtime story as it hurt too much. He had 10mls calpol then. Didnt settle for almost an hour but finally dropped off to sleep in my bed.
Woken up again about 9pm crying a lot again. Have now given nurofen too but still upset.

Called my OOH docs and message says 'the phone number has changed, call your DR surgery for new number'
My DR surgery has no bloody answer phone message on their line and onv closed.

Have called NHS direct and am waiting on a call back now. They did say they are VVVVVVV busy and only dealing with emergency cases though. Get the feeling they dont think earache is an emergency (which it isnt I know, but DS in lots of pain and I just really wanted to get hold of my OOh doctor!!)

Does it sound like ear infection that has come on suddenly? He has no temperature.

It does sound like an ear infection, but my only experience is DD who has had several but is only 18 mo. There would be a temperature but as you have recently given calpol and ibuprofen this may have brought it down. What does the ear look like? DD's was very visibly weeping, plus the ear itself was markedly red. The treatment is antibiotics and painkillers.

I hope NHS direct calls back soon. Do you know where the ooh doctor would be? Ours is at the local small hospital - if yours is similar maybe you need to head there if you don't think he'll get through the night with this level of pain? Really feel for you and hope it's sorted soon.

Thanks, he has dropped off again now, so am waiting for NHS direct to call back.
I do know where the OOH clinic is, thats a good idea to just drop in there if he wakes up in pain again and NHS direct havent called.
Am hoping that NHS direct can get me an appt at the clinic really as they normally only work on appts made in advance before turning up.
Thanks for the advice

Is the out of hours number on your Health Authority website anywhere.

I recently had an ear infection so can sympathise. I literally counted the hours until I was allowed my next dose of painkillers. That level of pain definately counts as an emergency. The only pain worse is toothache, its far worse than being in labour!

If it is an ear infection, be prepared for him to wake up really screaming at some point and then suddenly calm down. Both me and ds have history of lots of perforated eardrums from infections (less serious than it sounds), it's incredibly painful until the pressure causes a small hole in the eardrum then it eases straight away. Nurofen works best for it but just before it pops, nothing can ease the pain; but once it perforates, it is miles better. To be honest we have been through it so often that I am almost reassured when the pain gets really bad because that means it's about to go away!

agree with pixie, hot water bottle helps if he wakes up again.

We had this a few years ago - real pain until his ear drum suddenly burst (quite undramatic - don't think he was aware - just gunky stuff coming out) and then the pain suddenly stopped.
Took him to Docs next morning and given antibiotics and told not to fly/go swimming for 6 weeks. Never hapened since (I was worried that this would be one of those things that keeps reoccuring).
Hope he's OK.

My dd2 used to get ear infections regularly. Never showed any symptoms till 30 mins before the eardrum burst. Sounds to me like it'll go tonight, If it does, he'll get instant relief and you can get him to an OOH doc tomorrow. Sometimes if you can get them to suck on someting it helps to even out the pressure and reduce the pain, but it's a long shot i'm afraid.

Hope he fels better soon.

How is he this morning?

Thanks for asking. He seemed better this morning. He said the pain 'got sucked out' and stopped in the night!
I took him to the docs today anyway and he does have an ear infection. The Dr thinks it was the build up of pressure that was causing the bad pain and that the fluid could have drained away to releive it (pretty much like you all said!)
Thanks for all the advice, he is hopefully on the mend now!

Fel. Hope you asked your GP surgery what number you ring in an emergency as it is bonkers not to be able to get in touch with your OOH?.

I work for NHS direct and sometime v. v. busy and a nightmare. But.. If you had explained to the call handler all you wanted was your OOH GP number they could have looked it up for you straightaway from the database. Probably no need for nurse assessment (me!) I usually tend to sent ears for appointments anyway as can't bear LOs in pain! Takes a couple of days for abx to kick in so sadly it is mostly hit pain hard with calpol and brufen together