laryngomalacia in newborn; anyone any advice please?

[bubblepop]

has anyone out there ever experienced this condition with their child? I took my nearly four week old baby to the doctor today with her noisy breathing, and he is referring her to the hospital.Im really worried now.He said it might be this condition.

yes! my ds has/had this!

we were also really concerned about his breathing, he used to breathe in and then not be able to get it back out again! very scary...
anyway, after a long fight we eventually managed to get an appt with a paediatrician.
We went in for overnight monitoring where they basically wired him up to a machine , he had sensors taped under his nose. They monitored his breathing all night to make sure that the breathing wasn't stopping for too long at a time and that it wasn't causing any problems.

basically they said that he had it moderate-severe but that because it wasn't stopping him feeding (although he did struggle sometimes) and because he wasn't turning blue then they were happy to just leave it.

it occurs because the windpipe is too floppy. it should have stiff rings of cartilage to hold it out properly but with babies who have laryngeal or tracheal malacia it is floppy and when they breathe in it collapses in on itself which is why the breathing is so noisy.

we were assured that it is not painful for them. They said that unless it was causing severe breathing difficulties and or difficulty feeding then they would nto operate.
The operation they can do involves opening the chest and stitching the sides of the windpipe to nearby bits of whatever is round it!
they normally won't do this until a child is one, unless it is too severe.

Most children grow out of it at around 6 months but it does get worse before it gets better.
My ds is 11 months now and since he was about 6-7 months it has definitely been improving. He is fine in the day now but still quite noisy at night!

thankyou, thankyou...im upset and crying now thinking about this, can't seem to keep a rational head

My little one had this when he was born. He was a noisy breather and feeder. At about 12 weeks old he grew out of it. Sometimes it can go on for quite a while. The paediatricians usually have a 'wait and see' approach.

bubblepop ui'm sure your daughter will be fine! it sounds much worse than it is!
if it is "just" noisy breathing then she will grow out of it... as i say, it's only really a problem if it's stopping them feeding, or if they are turning blue!

let us know how you get on though