Recurring ear infection

[lifebeginz]

Hello - just wondering if anyone has any experiences of having a recurring ear infection and any ways to help alleviate.

I have been to my GP several times due to a recurring irritation, itching and weeping from my left ear on and off since last June. I am now on my 5th or 6th bottle of ear spray (two different types) and each one clears it up before it then returns say a week or so later.

Dr has looked into ear and advised outer ear is inflamed (drum not damaged) and also sent a swab away which showed only a yeast infection.

gave me a different spray and said to continue using it for a further week after initial treatment. Which i done... and symptoms have returned so I am likely going to need to go back to the GP again. I just wondered if anyone else has experienced similar and been able to pin point a cause/ found anything else that can help alleviate symptoms??

Initially GP thought it may have been caused by wearing headphones for work calls but I use these fairly rarely (1 hour a day max and not for a solid hour) and have since stopped using them completely to see if it helped....

Grateful for any advice, insight

Have you had your ear cleaned with microsuction?

It's hard for any spray or drops to get to the bits that need it in your ear without just getting stuck on wax/debris/general crud that is in the way.

Ohhh no... I have never heard of this. Is this something medical I would get at hospital? Or more of a "cosmeric" treatment I can find elsewhere?? At this stage I will try anything :)

It's medical. Look for a clinic near you offering ear wax removal with microsuction run by audiologists. There are loads now since the NHS stopped doing ear syringing.

You will need to pay privately but it’s absolutely worth it!

They won't suction your ears if you have an active infection, and might not if you have recurrent infections.

What they can do is refer you to your GP to refer you to ENT. (This is what happened with me, thpugh i did have to chase my GP, otherwise they'd have just sat with the letter from Specsavers forever more.)

What drops have you had? ENT did suction my ears and then gave me antibiotic drops to use, and this cleared them up. I've also been quite religious about using ear plugs for swimming, showering and bathing. I even used them in the sea. (Swimmers' ear plugs seem to be shelved by first aid rather than by ear stuff in the medical section of Boots and Superdrug near me, which isn't logical to me, but presumably it makes sense to someone...)

My son had this and it was an allergy to lactose.

I went through two bottles of antibiotic/steroid spray and three courses of oral antibiotics before my ear infection cleared. Unfortunately, as PP says, most microsuction people wont microsuction out the gunk from an infection even though the gunk stops the spray from working.