Switching to Prevacid

gi nurse is wrong….our gi TOLD us that ppi’s and h2 blockers compliment each other very nicely. marci-kids.com also says this, as long they are 4 hours apart. you can email marci-kids and they will confirm this for you. this is directly from their site: “It is ok to give a PPI drug at breakfast and supper and then four hours or more later at bedtime give an H-2 blocker”

http://www.marci-kids.com/treatments3.html

imo, i wouldnt even bother with the 7.5 mg dose once a day. to be honest i have been here for quite a while and have never heard of a baby being successful with that low of a dose.

also remember that solutabs have to be given on an empty stomach and followed with a full meal 30-60 min later, it can be tricky sometimes.

no it does not have to be 12 hours apart.

as for the timing of the 30-60 min…its so hard when they are that young 🙁 we were doing a compound with caracream at that age so we didnt have to time with meals.

try dissolving the solutab in a little plastic cup with a teaspoon of water. maybe then try syringing the medicine in his mouth. i know a lot of people have done this with sleeping babies.

here is more info about timing the prevacid:

How Delayed Release PPIs Work

In their pure and unprotected form, PPIs are very vulnerable to degradation when exposed directly to the acid in the stomach. For this reason, DR PPIs are given an enteric coating. This protective coating is specifically designed not to dissolve while the drug is in the acidic fluids in the stomach, but instead it dissolves when the tablet or granules reach the higher pH (less acidic) environment of the duodenum (the first section of the small intestine). Here the coating dissolves and the drug is absorbed into the blood stream, where it is carried to the parietal cells, where it does its job of blocking proton pumps. This whole process takes 30 minutes to 1 hour.

DR PPIs should be given on an empty stomach because food in the stomach can both lower the level of absorption and raise the pH in the stomach, causing the enteric coating on the drug to dissolve, which then leaves the drug vulnerable to exposure to pockets of acid in the stomach which could destroy the drug.

DR PPIs should be given 30 minutes to 1 hour before a full meal (6 oz or more for infants). As I already mentioned, in order for PPIs to work their best you want as many proton pumps to be in an active state as possible, and the primary way of achieving this is by eating a full meal. The timing is important because you want the meal to be activating lots of proton pumps right at the same time that the drug is reaching peak levels in the blood stream.

DR PPIs should taken with water or sprinkled over an acidic food such as apple sauce or yogurt.

You should never break or crumble a tablet form of DR PPI, as this will compromise the protective enteric coating. (Prevacid Solutabs contain enteric-coated granules within the tablet, and it is ok to break a Solutab in half, as this should not harm the individual granules)

You should never give a DR with a non-acidic food (such as milk, formula or cereal), as this will dissolve the enteric coating and leave the drug unprotected.

DR PPIs should never be chewed or crushed, as this will compromise the protective enteric coating.

For infants, MARCI-Kids recommends the use of the IR PPI Zegerid over DR forms of PPIs, as infants can easily spit out, chew or even choke on the granules of DR PPIs. Of the DR PPIs, Prevacid Solutabs seem to be the easiest to administer for most parents.

https://www.infantreflux.org/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=6026&a mp;KW=treating+gerd

We started on 7.5mg/day and it helped some after 3 weeks, we went to 7.5mg 2x/day for just over 2 wks and About 10days ago we went to 15mg 2x/day, which is actually more than I asked for I asked for 7.5mg 3x/day but my ped gi says they only need to be given at most 2x/day, which is actually easier b/c I only have to time it around 2 meals instead of 3. I would definately keep up the Axid, my husband is a pharmacist and we did it until the prevacid kicked in and I trust him more than some doctors when it comes to meds since that is what he went to school for.

What we do for timing of the med is: I do try to space the doses 12hrs apart, somedays it works others it doesn’t. I try to give it first thing in the morning while he is asleep and give him his paci and he goes right back to sleep and then I wake him up usually about 45minutes later. And I either give it to him again before his bedtime bottle and then we go for a walk and do his bedtime routine and then feed and go to bed for the night. Cooper has just recently started not taking a bottle over night so some mornings I have to give his 1st dose with his 2nd bottle of the day b/c he wakes up so hungry that I can’t wait 30 mintues. Being flexible is key. After 7 wks of prevacid last week I finally found a great way to give it to him (solutab). I take the tablet, put it in a syringe and draw up 2-3ml of water. flick the syringe and get as much of the tab in the part where it comes out and give him a squirt and then flick more med in the cylinder and squirt and continue that until it is all gone. By doing this he doesn’t drool it out or push it back out with his tongue. Cooper is alittle older than Brady so this would probably be a good way for you to give it as well. If I need to give him more water to get all the med in him I do. And I give him his paci afterwards so that that helps him suck and get the meds down. Good Luck.

you’re not the first to strain out the beads… so if it’s working for you, I would continue to do what works best…you’re also not the first to break open the capsules- but I THINK if you do this then you need to give it with some apple sauce or apple juice- there might be more info about this in Prevacid 101?

DR PPIs should taken with water or sprinkled over an acidic food such as apple sauce or yogurt.

hellbennt2007-6-25 12:42:55