- This topic has 14 replies, 1 voice, and was last updated 19 years, 6 months ago by
.
-
Please help. We are new parents and recently found out our son has reflux. He is on Zantac, and seemed to be relieved for about 2 weeks. We are also adding cereal to his formula. Tried breast feeding, too, but that wasn’t any better. It seems to be about every other day that he is fussy all day long and nothing will make him content. We try everything, walking, lying on stomach, bouncy seat and nothing makes him content. He is currently taking Zantac, I think about .7 ml. I feel like I’m on the phone with the doctor every other day, not just for the reflux, but he has an infected tear duct and now he has thrush. Any advice to help him be more comfortable and any advice to help with his excruciating gas pains would be greatly appreciated.Hello and welcome,
I’ve had two reflux babies so I sure know how hard it is.
First, you need to know that Zantac proves to be very ineffective for most babies. It’s a very weight sensitive drug and so it’s common for the baby to get some initial relief but then it stops working. Usually they need many increases as they grow (even in as little as two weeks) and eventually many babies plateau on it and can’t get any relief from it. Most of us have found that PPI meds are much more effective and not so weight sensitive. You can read about these meds at http://www.marci-kids.com I’d suggest that you print some of this information from marci-kids and fax it or take it to your baby’s pediatrician and try to get him on a good dose of Prevacid or Zegerid. Most doctors will underdose since they are not aware of the current research at marci-kids that shows babies metabolize these drugs 3-4 times faster than adults, so they usually need higher doses given 2-3 times per day.
In the meantime you can try some Mylanta Cherry Supreme. Many of us use it and it can give some temporary relief. How old is he?
Is he on Diflucan for his thrush? My daugher had thrush once and Diflucan cleared it up in just a few days.
What formula is he on? You say he has lots of gas in addition to his reflux. It’s posible that he also has MSPI (milk soy protein intolerance), so a hypo or elemental formula may help.
You can read lots of good information about reflux and mspi in Laura’s intro (stickied in the Introduce Yourself forum).
Good luck and glad you found us. Hang in there. It’s hard but it really does get easier once you gets the meds and formula worked out. We’ll all help you as much as we can.
Hello and welcome,
Boy I can remember those days only to well, knowing something isn’t right, but not feeling as if anyone will listen and that nothing I was doing was helping. There were a fair few tears in my house.
But things do get better and here we are months down the track finally weaning of medicines. So things will get better. Things really turned around for me when I found this site so I hope we can help you.
Firstly, a lot of us find that Zantac works initially and then stops. It is very weight sensitive so the dose needs to be adjusted up fairly regularly. My guess is that your dose is probably low (most Drs underdose it). If you post your bubs weight someone will help you out. It also seems that the bubs become “less sensitive” to zantac so even if the dose keeps going up it doesn’t have as good as effect.
Secondly, at some point most of us have had to move on from Zantac to another medication…a PPI (proton pump inhibitor). he can read all about them at marci-kids.com. These meds have been a life saver for most of us and once on the right dose (most drs underdose these too) many babies do very well. In the meantime you could try some mylanta cherry supreme to see if it takes the edge of things a bit.
thirdly, it seems a lot of drs just don’t know much about infant reflux or what is the current research in the area. You might have to educate them or find a Dr who is willing to be educated.
Some babies with reflux also have MSPI (milk soy protein intolerance). They can also seem fussy, in pain etc and often have mucous in stools or other allergic responses (like exzma). The gas pains could be from the cereal? Some mums find thickening helps, but others don’t.
To help us help you a little-
How old is your bub?
What are his symptoms (eg arching, refusing feeds etc)?
What formula are you using?
What type of cereal are you using?
I’m so glad you found us and I hope we can help you. Please know that this will improve. It took us a few weeks to get everything figured out with Alana (she was diagnosed about 7-8 weeks). But once we did things improved dramatically.
Welcome again.
That’s exactly how my babies acted during feedings. I could tell they were hungry, but they’d take a few sips and then start screaming and refusing anymore. It’s because they are hungry but they are also in pain. I imagine it would be like sitting down to a meal when you have heartburn.
I personally would not try soy. Many babies who have intolerances to milk also are intolerant to soy. He may not even have a problem with his formula, it may be straight reflux. Neither of my babies had any problems with milk except that they got eczema. For them it was just a matter of getting them on a good dose of a PPI medication. Ellie sadly was never on a PPI was miserable for 9 months, but I was fortunate to have found this site and marci-kids when my son was born and he was finally put on a good dose of Prevacid. 10 days later he was happy and eating like a “normal” baby. So, I’d suggest asking for a PPI medication. Read the info at marci-kids first so you are armed with good information and print it out in case your doc is skeptikal.
Getting back to formula, if you want to try another one I’d suggest Alimentum RTF. (The powder contains a lot of corn which bothers some babies, the RTF has much less or no corn), BUT I’d also push for that PPI medication because his symptoms definitely sound like reflux.(He could have both reflux and mspi…many babies do). The problem with making two changes at once is that when things improve you won’t know if it was the meds or the formula, but personally I wouldn’t care. If my baby was in pain I’d try both options and sort it out later.
Also I’d try stopping the rice cereal. Many babies get very gassy and consitpated on it. Are you using it to help with his reflux, or because he chokes on thinner feedings? It’s really trial and error with everything related to reflux, and thickening is one of those things. For some babies it helps, but for others it does nothing to improve the reflux and it can actually make things worse for some babies (because of the gas and constipation).
Well, good luck. I know it’s a lot to take in. But just keep asking questions and all the experienced and wonderful moms here will help in any way they can.
I would just go straight to asking for a PPI…it sounds like classic reflux and the Zantac clearly isn’t working. Arm yourself with the info from Marci-kids as Christine suggested and if your dr won’t go for it go to another (it was my family dr, not the pead who agreed to the meds and the dose
). We did meds and formula at the same time and it was hard to work out if she really had MSPI…so we had to do a normal formula trial later to work it out. It turns out she couldn’t tolerate a normal formula but it was still a bit confusing until then. My advice would be to get the right meds first at the right dose and look into formula once you have the meds worked out.
I would also think about dropping the cereal…Alana reacted to cereal around that age too (although I know some bubs do well on it).
And yes…this reflux stuff sure does suck
Went to the doc today. Took him off cereal, put him on Nutramigen formula and starting w/ 7.5 mg of Prevacid. She did say I could increase it to 15 mg. How long should I wait to see if I should increase it? How do you get this stuff to dissolve? It seems there it a little bit left in the end of the syringe. Is exzema common? He has some dry spots on his cheeks, but she thinks it’s subhorrea (???). She gave me some hydrocortisone cream for it. Thanks so much for all of your help. Hopefully we’re started in the right direction.
hi there,
everyone has welcomed you w/ great infantreflux.org style
!I have a lot to say & it’s found ‘stickied’ (the top post) as ‘groupie Intro’ in the Introduce Yourself Forum (this post is in the ‘Help’ Forum
)glad you found us!
~laura
ps: babywearing
- The forum ‘HELP!!!’ is closed to new topics and replies.
