Possible Fluid

[Anonymous]

We went to Jackson’s appointment at UNC Hospital last week. The doc pretty much just told us that there was nothing we could do about his persistent reflux and that we were just going to have to tough it out. One thing that he said (in contradiction to my pediatrician- who I am beginning to think is an idiot) is that doctors cannot accurately detect whether fluid is in the ear just by looking in it. He said that the machine is critical to determining whether fluid is in the ear after infections. My pediatrician, on the other hand, said that there was no need to worry and that she could tell whether fluid was present. I trust the specialist since he has about 20 years on her and teaches at a top medical school. That being said, Jackson has had two known ear infections, spits up buckets (sometimes through nose) and is not babbling. He also does not always seem to know when we first walk in a room. He will turn once I say “Jackson” but he does not always hear the door open. He also makes lots of consonant noises, but he does not couple them with vowels. In other words, he does a lot of mmmmmm or ppppppp or bbbbbbb, but no babababa or mamamama, etc. It is like he does it because he feels it. He will occasionally let out a ba or ma or da- but only one syllable. So, pursuant to the specialist’s recommendation, I made an appt with the ENT to have Jackson’s hearing tested and check for fluid (the right way!). I am irritated that we have not been carefully monitoring this in the past. If he has had residual fluid for a few months, that could really have affected his hearing.

My questions are:

1) Have your doctors encouraged ENT visits after ear infections or do they just glance in your baby’s ear and send you on your way? According to the specialist (who seemed to be very intelligent) this is NOT enough.

2) For those of you who have babies who had standing fluid, did your babies make a lot of closed mouth sounds (mmmmm, bbbbb, ppppp)? Also Jackson makes high pitched squeals.

Thanks Ladies!

[Anonymous]

Owen had many, many problems with ears, and nearly every time we took him in, he had infection. That being said, when the infections cleared up, he always had standing fluid. I became concerned when he didn’t start forming words as well as my older son did and at 16 mo had a 2nd set of tubes placed. My doc was not great (pedi) but after we got the reflux under control and MSPI, he seemed to be more in tune to my concerns b/c of our past and took me for what I said. It does sound like your concerns are valid and he should be seen by an ENT. They say 6 infections in 6 mo is kind of a rule of thumb, we didn’t have that many, the ones we had never cleared with meds and that can be another indicator.

Tubes, in my opinion, are a very simple fix to a long road of speech difficulties and secondly ear infections are PAINFUL!!!!! My next door neigbor has a daughter who really struggles in school and she is sure it is b/c she didn’t have the hearing she needed when she was young for processing and learning sounds. It’s like she’s always been under water.

As for the sounds, I think he should make the ma, da, ba by now. But it really sounds like he’s not hearing you if he doesn’t notice you until you say his name.

Do you need a referral to get into an ENT? I would just make my own appt and ask around (friends/family) if anyone knows a good ENT. Once you get in, if the person is good, they are not going to blow you off.

[Anonymous]

Oh, and he had his first set of tubes at 9 mo and they worked wonders. Unfortunately, they clogged up quickly and after 6 mo they had fallen out. But they took his adenoids also this time and he’s doing great so far.

[Anonymous]

Hi

On both of my girls the fluid was undected my their ped, but when we went to the ent both girls had fluid based on the tympanogram test. They place a little device right next to the ear to see if the ear drum is moving. I orginaly took Ashlynn to the ent to check her hearing which she passed the test,but did have fluid build up. She and sissy had tubes placed on the 29th of April. Danika had her 2nd set plus adenoids and it has done wonders for her. I find that Ashlynn is babbling more now since she had her tubes. I would go to a ent to check for standing fluid because this can affect the way the hear things, like erica described above

“beeing under water”

Hope this helps

stcwatt2008-06-10 11:38:02

[Anonymous]

I’m just going to piggyback on what the others have already said. Landen had a lot of ear infections and if his ears were not infected, he had fluid in them constantly! Don’t ever let anyone tell you constant standing fluid is OK. It is hard for them to hear and it can cause discomfort for them. Landen had tubes put in his ears 5 months ago and he has not had 1 infection and no fluid since. Just a week after his tubes were placed he started talking up a storm and is talking like crazy now. I truly beleive he couldn’t hear himself make sounds very well and was not hearing what we were saying to him very well either until he had tubes. I’d def see an ENT so you can get a clear cut answer on what is going on and make an informed decision on what the ENT has to say. I’m hoping Landen’s tubes will last a while, but if his fall out we are going to do adenoids and tubes next time. His ENT really thought his adenoids needed to come out last time b/c he has a loud snore when sleeping and he said they were enlarged, but Landen was kind of young to have them removed first go-round.

Good luck! let us know how he is doing with all of this.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the information! Did your babies makes sounds like mmmm, bbbbb, ddddd, but not babababa, dadadada, mamama when fluid was present? Jackson will occasionally make a da or ba, but not true babbling. I read that babies who are not hearing clearly make a lot of sounds that they feel and Jackson seems to do that. He also does not make the clearest sounds. I am not sure if that makes sense, but his sounds seem muffled. What kind of sounds were your little ones making when they had fluid?

I have an ENT appt Monday! I am ready to get to the bottom of this. Jackson is SUCH a social little boy, so it does not make sense that he would not be babbling. He even copied my sister clapping the other day! I know for a fact that he had fluid in his ears for at least 5 weeks after his first ear infection because the doc saw it when she looked in his ear. She just acted like it was no big deal and did not mention anything about monitoring it! After the second one, she blew me off when I asked her if we needed to get him checked for residual fluid. And she said all of this with knowledge that Jackson is not babbling, spits up through his nose a lot, has had ear infections, etc. If there is one thing that I have learned through this whole reflux experience it is to not take the doctor’s word as final. We have to do our own research and look out for the best interest of our babies. I worked as a lawyer before staying at home and there are definitely good and bad lawyers. Sadly, the same is true for doctors.

[hellbennt]

one thought: I’ve read here, on the board (no personal experience) that when you go for tubes (rather I should say if one goes for tubes), you can ask for them to test the ph of the fluid- lets you know if it’s reflux related…

[Anonymous]

laura

I asked thr ent the day he put ash’s tubes in and he looked at me like i was crazy or suprised that i asked this?. He said that it would be hard to tell since she is on a ppi(nexium). He also said that the new studies suggest that reflux might be a cause but not a definite one for rep. ear infections. Danika my two year old had numerous ei,but she did not have reflux.

Katie:

Ashlynn had days where she would babble alot and days where she would not. But I have noticed since the tubes she is starting to babble different sounds. SHe finally started mum mum. . The ent watched Ashlynn’s fluid for about 4 months to see if it would go away on it’s own. I;m glad that I did this because I did not want it to hurt her speech. Danika my 2yo was a talker and boy does she talk more now after her 2nd set. 1st set did not saty because of fluid build up, so that is why we removed the adenoids. Now she sleeps like a baby??(what’s that). -+

stcwatt2008-06-10 15:59:52

[Anonymous]

Just wanted to say that with my first son, I became convinced that he had residual fluid in his ears (after a really, really bad cold at age 6 months) because he was constantly pulling at them and didn’t babble much at all. I don’t remember exactly what kinds of sounds he was making, though. But anyway, I took him several times to the ped to have his ears checked, thinking they were either infected or had fluid in them, and she always said “nope, they’re clear.”

But when Baron was around 9 months, I finally went over the ped and took him to the ENT without a referral. She also examined his ears and told me they looked clear, but she wanted to do the tympanogram (sp?) test to be sure. It took just a few seconds, then she went out of the room to check the results. When she came back, she said, “this is why we do tests!” There was in fact fluid in both ears, and it had been there at least 3 months. We had ear tubes put in the next week, and no problems since. We were one of those rare cases where the baby needed tubes even though he had never had a single infection, just residual fluid.

Oh, and now Baron talks really clearly for his age and NEVER shuts up 🙂 So don’t worry, you are being very proactive and I’m sure whatever you decide to do, Jackson will be fine.

Good luck 🙂

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