To have grommet surgery?

[Blabbermouth96]

My daughter, 18 months, suffered with a horrendous ear infection last year which lasted 6 weeks, four rounds of antibiotics, ear drops, admission to hospital, and a referral to ENT. We saw the ENT team last month and they confirmed she has glue ear in both ears and offered me the following options.

• wait it out and see if she grows out of it
• 3 months of antibiotics, once a day, three times a week
• or grommet surgey

i chose to wait it out because she already has resistance to antibiotics and needed the strongest antibiotics you can get to clear her first ear infection. And at the time the surgery wasn’t really explained to me and I felt it was a big deal and not necessary so I turned it down.

anyway, we’re now one week into another ear infection, she was prescribed Amoxicillin again (which I told the Dr doesn’t work) and we’ve finished the course and she still has discharge coming from her ear.

my question is, at this point should I be considering surgery? I have no concerns about her speech right now, but I do have big concerns about her resistance to antibiotics and how it might affect her when she’s older.

thanks

My son had the grommet surgery and I really recommend it. Even though his hearing improved, he still needed speech therapy. At 18 months, their speech is developing, so any hearing impairment will definitely hamper their progress. We had no regrets, just relief that his hearing improved.

My son had grommets but aged 5. The difference nky just in what he could hear but also in how happy and balanced he was was amazing - I didn’t know how much he was suffering. If I’d have known weave got it done sooner. So I would consider it.
In our case his speech wasn’t massively impacted (compared to his peers) but he’s excelled and come on so much since.
He never had ear infections so I can’t comment on that

Poor thing. Ear infections are the pits.

I had grommets as a kid, I think it's a pretty safe surgery.

What is your gut instinct?

It’s funny you mention balance. Do you literally mean balance and coordination? I only ask as her childminder and I agree she’s been very clumsy lately

My gut is saying to speak to the GP about surgery. Annoyingly in her discharge letter from ENT they had written that they don’t recommend surgery at this stage even though it was offered! I think I’ll have to go through the entire referral process again

Yes, go back have another chat. And find out as much as you can in the meantime.