ear infection & perforated ear drum for xmas.....

[Schmauskin]

Have just been in & out of hospital for last 4 days with my 17 mth dd. She has an ear infection with burst ear drum, very high temp, a stinking cold and a suspected virus - oh and she's beginning to teethe her eye teeth - nice! Does anyone have an advice or experience on ear infections,
how to prevent/treat etc please. She's had 1 before and after the hell of the last few days, I want to try and prevent more if poss. Thanks, very tired, worried first time mum x

going for a kip 'cos dd asleep now, but would really love some advice please...

Hi there!

Sorry your dd is unwell. Hope she is better soon. My ds is now 3, and we are now hopefully over our bad luck of his ear infections. He has sufferred really badly in the past and had grommets in aged 2. I switched him from cows milk to goats milk and that has really seemed to help, much less mucas.

I was told by my dr that the best thing for ear infections is using calpol & nurofen together (alternating, although can be used at the same time if pain is really bad), making sure the head is elevated when they lie down. Sometimes using a warm compress on the side that hurts can be helpful for the pain. As for helping to not get another ear infection. I was told not to get ds's ear wet for about a week after his perforated drum and then to make sure that his ear canal was dried properly. Ds had another ear infection in the summer for no apparent reason and the only thing we can think of is that he must have got water in his ears after being in the paddling pool.

Good luck. I hope your dd is feeling better soon.

Drinking milk while lying down is meant to cause ear problems. My DS1 had two or three perforated ear drums, but seems to have grown out of the problem.

You have my sympathy. Have you tried Medised for nighttime, so she sleeps?

Chances are it is a one off. Both mine have had ear drum perforations from occasional ear infections which came on suddenly. My best advice is to try to minimise congestion during a cold - blowing or aspirating her nose regularly, Olbas oil type drops on pillow or tissue in pillow case, vaporiser etc, prop her head up a bit to stop it building up at night. At the first sign of ear pain use Nurofen which has an anti-inflammatory effect that may be sufficient to stop it getting so far.

Hope dd is more comfortable now.

Thank you thank you thank you! am giving nurofen and calpol alternatively, and now have some parcacetamol suppositorys 'cos she was sick when taking medicine earlier. LIZS, have elevated the cot with phone directories - should i give her a little pillow too? Heartmum2Jamie - do you think I should avoid swimming completely then?? - she's been having lessons since 6 months.
where you all given antibiotics with the ear infections?

We always find that an antihistamine such as piriton or medised (paracetamol and antihistamine) reduces the pressure until the eardrum pops. Usually ds feels tonnes better once it actually pops and the pressure's gone. Agree about being careful with water if it actually pops but ds still goes swimming if his ears are having a good run!

I try to avoid antibiotics as much as possible (otherwise he's have them all the time!) Usually give him a while to get better on his own then get the antibiotics if he's still bad/getting worse after a few days.

Not sure if it available in UK but we had some Ibruprofen based suppositories abroad. ds had raging earache on holiday and a day of those was enough to clear it up. Sometimes we've had AB's sometimes not, usually have with a perforation iirc. The directories should help !

Our doc doesn't give antibiotics if ds's eardrum has already perforated or looks like it's about to?

We normally get the script for the antibiotics but I don't usually get it made up unless it has been more than a few days with no improvement. as for swimming, I would let her swim (although maybe give it a week or 2 for her ear drum to repair itself. Just make sure that you dry her ears really good.

Took DS off dairy and recurrent ear infections and glue ear cleared up almost immediately.

It is a big step to take though, so you need to be sure that there is some degree of dairy intolerance there that is contributing to the problem.

Other indications would be excess drooling and dribbling, posseting up curdy milk when a baby, green snotty nose a lot of the time etc.

thank you mums for the advice - how long is ok for my little girl to be off her food then? She's only had a tiny amount of solids since Xmas morning (fluid intake fine)
and she's never done it before, so anxious.

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Thanks for that giddy1, will ask the GP when when go and see him next week. My dd seems to be improving - temp is stable around 37.5 and she has finally eaten a bit of breakfast and a little pasta for lunch. She is still very congested, has a nasty cough and really foul smelling runny poo, but I guess it will just take a while for her to get back to normal. I will just have to keep a very watchful eye on her when she gets her next cold, 'cos i don't want her to go thru this again if i can prevent it!