How do you get baby to take medicine?

[Samsean]

Hi,

My 3 month old needs to take her reflux medicine but keeps spitting it out. I've tried different positions, pointing syringe at cheek, spoon etc. she is ebf and refuses to drink from a bottle. What can I do?

Which medicine is it? If it is ranitidine, it tastes awful. With both my DDs I had to use a 1ml syringe and squirt it right to the back of their mouth, past the tongue, so they could not spit it out. Then put a dummy in straight away.

DD2 is now 11 months and is perfectly happy to take her ranitidine so she seems to have got used to the taste.

Syringe should work? Not sure what you mean by pointing syringe at the cheek though... I am afraid you might need to be more hands on. Without wanting to sound mean but this is how I do it: pin baby down, open jaw by pressing with your thumb and middle finger on the cheeks, that will open the mouth, syringe at back of tongue... Hope this helps, and good luck!

She's on lansoparazole, strawberry flavour. Ill try getting that syringe right to the back of her mouth, but I think she will still spit it out!

What size syringe are you using? The really thin 1ml size makes it easier to get to the back of the mouth.

Suppositories! They probably aren't available for reflux medicine. But it was a revelation when I went abroad and was convinced to use suppositories instead of liquid ibuprofen for DD's teething problems. She used to spit out the liquid stuff, but the suppositories worked like a charm. I can't recommend them highly enough.

We were shown a few ways by doctors to get drugs into our ds. One was to squirt into back of throat as others have suggested, and then rub their throats as it makes them swallow (like when worming a cat!) the other is still getting it to back if throat but then blowing in their face. They automatically swallow. Both ways work, it's not pleasant and our ds never liked it but he couldn't spit it out...luckily now we just put it in a yogurt and he eats it :)

My dd hated strawberry omeprazole but the banana goes in with less of a fight.

Ds1 was on ranitidine, omeprazole (pre-strawberry flavour, when it was a tablet crushed and mixed with water - vile), domperidone and laxatives, and initially fought the lot! Hold them tight, use a narrow syringe, aim for the back corner of the mouth as it stimulates the swallowing reflex and makes it harder to spit out, very small squirts alternating with sliding a dummy into lo's mouth (if they have a dummy). Involves hooking the dummy over your little finger so you can slide it in in lightning speed!

Thanks! Ill give it a try