Anyone have a son that gets repeated balinitis?

[IlanaK]

My 2.5 year seems to have it again for the third time in less than two months. He gets given antibiotics each time and then two weeks after the last dose, it comes back. The last three times required GP visits, but I think he may have had it in mild form many times before that but fought it off himself as it is not unusual for him to have a red end of his penis.

I am not happy for him to just have antibiotics every two weeks but am not sure what else to do about it. I read the recent thread about pulling back or not pulling back to wash and have tried the sort of swishing in the bath thing without pulling back. But it did not stop this most recent bout.

I know that GP's will not recommend circumcision without many many repeated bouts, but how mnay times is it safe to keep having antibiotics??

Any advice anyone?

How about putting salt in the bath, as that kills off some stuff. DS1 used to get really sore end of his when he was 3/4 now 7 hasn't happened in ages. HTH

Interesting suggestion aboutu the salt. Unfortunatley, ds has quite bad excema. Not sure salt would be good for that at all. We currently have to put a special perscription oil in the bath for him.

Sorry about that, its just it really helped with ds1.

bumping this in case anyone else has any advice before I see the doctor tomorow.

IlanaK, Seasalt (from healthfood shop, try and get them to buy in bulk for you as much cheaper) is absolutely FANTASTIC for eczema!

So definitely try that.

I would gently pull back and swish, so that some of the water can get in there....but you know that already don't you ;)

try a homeopath? antibiotics clearly not working (ime, for many things they don't, they seem to suppress but not get rid of iyswim, have found this to be true with impetigo, and conjunctivitis, in both cases homeopathy worked and kept working, no repeat bouts...worth a try?).

Yes, loads of experience with this problem!

ds1 (now 10) has had repeated bouts of balanitis throughout the last 8 years. he is under a paediatric urologist for this and we have had a lot of consultations with him.

The basic advice the prof has given us is that he does not want to circumcise ds and sees no reason to do this in spite of the repeated infectons because these will clear up naturally themselves as ds reaches puberty and his foreskin enlarges. Circumscision was an option for a while because ds's foreskin had scarred due to one very nasty balanitis infection and the consultant was worried that the scarring would prevent it from naturally stretching. He treated ds with steroid cream which made the foreskin become loads more flexible only to boing back to tight again once we stopped the cream.

Now ds's foreskin seems as tight as ever (to me) but the prof is adamant that it is normal (even the infections) and that he doesn't need to do anything more for ds .

My own research has found that there are also some less radical surgical options which can help before circumscision and I feel that I'd probably want to try these for ds if it came to that.

I'd be really interested to know what advice you get tomorrow. Good luck

Thanks Sophable. The bath swishing thing is not working at the moment. I agree about the antibiotics. I think this is the same infection as the last two times, but the antibiotics are only suppressing it. My other ds gets repeated impetigo. We keep fucidin on hand for it, but again, it reccurrs with frequency.

As to a homeopath, I am not totally against the idea. However, (and this is not going to sound very good), we are spending a fortune on ongoing osteopathy at the moment (which I feel is vital for other health issues they both have). I am just not sure I could justify a second alternative therapy. However, I will certainly keep it in mind.

Seasalt is something we could definately try. I will see if I can buy some. Do you have a link to anything I could read up on it as regards to the excema please?

Shimmy - the thought of dealing with this for 8 more years horrifies me!

Thanks again.

sea salt cleared ds's eczema when nothing else was doing anything.

for impetigo...try hepar sulph and graphites in 30c potency (can get in boots) alternately every couple of hours so that you are doing 3 a day of each.

really really clears it permanently i have found.

we are treating our first bout of balanitis so have lots of sympathy for you. I know it sounds a bit obvious, but if you are worried about salt in the bath, you can always put some in a cup of warm water and dip it in!

My GP printed off some info for me today and it says that balinitis can be caused from three different things and should be treated differently depending on what it is. If it is the cadida bacteria, then it needs something like canesten. If it is an infection then it needs antibiotics. If it is a skin irritation causing it, then steroid cream is more suitable.

I think in ds's case, it is caused by his excema. The GP did give antibiotics but also said that once it has cleared, I should be creaming his penis with diprobase that we use on the rest of him and I should also speak to his dermatologist so maybe he needs the steroid creams we use on the rest of him in that area too.