OK, mamas, I need some help/advice.
My baby has had "reflux" since he was about three months old. He is now 11 months old and we've seen no sign of improvement (either in the volume or frequency). He is on Prevacid for the pain, and we use Simply Thick along with rice cereal in all his bottles. Evne with solid foods, he is spitting up a large amount.
We've had an upper GI and just had an endoscopy this morning, which have come up with nothing (to my relief and dismay).
I wouldn't even care about the spitting up/throwing up because it doesn't faze him at all. My concern is he is not gaining weight and is falling off the growth charts. He was a big, healthy 8 pound 6 ounce newborn, but at 11 months, is only 18 pounds 4 ounces.
The doctor said after the biopsies come back on Wednesday, if they are clear, we need to start thinking of other causes for his "reflux".
Can you tell me what your experiences have been with this and what your children were finally diagnosed with? Any advice and guidance is most greatly appreciated.
My son had it until he was over a year old. It was SO bad at first until we found something that worked. Prevacid did nothing for us. We ended up using Zantac that helped SO much. Don't give up, keep pushing the issue with your doctor until you get some relief for your baby.
Best Regards,
C.
Dairy is one of the primary culprits in terms of reflux - either in formula or when a breastfeeding mother consumes dairy. I learned this the hard way as my first son sounds like yours. I was off dairy with my second son, who was almost 9 lbs at birth and quickly gained 1 lb/week for the first month and then 1/2 lb per week for the next 5 months - his weight gain finally slowed down when he was 6 mos. This is contrasted with my first son who was similar in size as yours at close to a year.
Also, gluten intolerance/celiac can be a primary cause of poor weight gain. We didn't learn that this was impacting my older son until he was 10. At age 2, the doctor said he would be petite (I am, but dad is 6'3"). Once my son started the GF diet, he grew 4 inches per year and gained 20 lbs per year for 4+ years. At 15, he's now 6'4".
I can't urge you strongly enough to consider both the dairy and gluten correlations with reflux. Also, the prevacid, etc. reduce stomach acid and thus make digestion of nutrients far less effective.
You can get both the dairy and gluten tests done on your own: www.enterolab.com
I used to recommend the blood tests that you could ask your doctor to run but most doctors are still clueless about this and rarely run the right tests even when asked. And, when they do run the right tests, they don't know how to interpret. So, you can save yourself alot of grief and money by running the tests on your own. Since it is a dietary change, you really don't need a doctor involved, however, you should share any results with your doctor. Once I had my sons tested, the pediatrician was fully accepting of the diagnosis (I'm hoping this opened his eyes to this situation). We have a family friend whose a pediatrician who was very interested to understand the symptoms that my boys had, so he could start looking for this in his patients. As far as endoscopies, they are often inconclusive at this stage as it is rare for there to be enough damage for GI docs to pick this up - it takes nearly 100% damage to the intestines - of which there are many feet in the body - for an endoscopy to be accurate.
The enterolab stool test is by far the most accurate available - the lab has all the necessary certifications and then some. It was started by a top GI doctor in Dallas - he felt it was his mission to share this testing immediately rather than waiting the 10-20 years to have this accepted as standard practice. Many progressive docs run this test. And, slowly even the most conventional of GI docs (including the top celiac one) are coming around the the significant value of this testing. Testing for celiac via endoscopy is a 50 year old way to diagnose celiac and it likely will be phased out with the next 5 years.
Celiac is the MOST highly underdiagnosed condition in this country (only about 6% of the people with this condition have been diagnosed), which is why it is something that should be tested in ANY child with poor weight gain, reflux, any tummy troubles, rashes, etc.
Also, folks with older kids should consider this testing for any child diagnosed with learning disorders, in particular ADD/ADHD. There is research showing that both the gluten and dairy proteins have significant impact on the brain. There is a top psychiatrist that does brain imaging and he has seen these impacts.
Hi, L.!
Have you had your son checked for food allergies, celiac, or food intolerances?
At 11 months old 18 pounds is not too small. He could just be leveling out or he could be having other problems. Some babies are born big but not meant to stay that way and others are big and continue on as big.
I would take him to an allergist and have him checked for food allergies. We see Dr. John Van Wagoner in Plano. He is with SW Allergy and Asthma and we love him.
Who is your GI doctor? Has he mentioned Celiac disease or gluten intolerance? We see Dr. Baker, also in Plano, and really like him as well. My son had endoscopy this week as well since he is nearly 6 and still suffers from reflux, even though he is taking 30 mg of Prevacid. His was normal as well.
FYI...someone mentioned digestion of nutrients in relation to Prevacid. My son has been on reflux meds since he was 2 weeks old and is very healthy. There are studies correlating calcium deficiency with the Prevacid but so far his vitamin stores, despite being off dairy since birth, are still good.
Good luck! E-mail me if you need any more information.
My twin daughter had the same problem at 2 months old (that was 27 yrs ago). Her pediatrician kept guessing at what it was. After being referred to another pediatrician who consulted a pulmonary specialist he confirmed that she had a reflux ("the lid on the top of the esophagus would not close after swallowing"). The treatment was quite simple: Feed her rice cereal with the formula she was on (which was Soy milk). MOST IMPORTANT: allow her to sit in an upward position in her carrier after each feeding for at least 30-45 minutes. She never, ever threw up her food again. As she grew (abt 2-3months) the condition corrected itself. Hope this helps. It definitely worked for us.
My daughter had that for the first few months of life. It took me four pediatricians to identify the problem - we haven't let go of Dr. Karam since!!! If you are looking for a second opinion - Dr. Albert Karam ###-###-####. He's awesome!
