Baby gaining less than average weight.

[buttonbaby]

Thanks again lolly, great to chat to someone well in the know on this! Ds’s poohs have already changed – not as loose, still doing a  lot so not constipated yet but am so worried he will be as I know the thing to help is cool boiled water but having so much trouble getting milk in I won’t know when to give him the water..if I give it before a feed he may not take milk and after one he may not take anything else! But am so scared he’l get it and don’t want him to suffer more!

Also as he is not getting much I don’t want to take him off the high calorie formula…on Friday eh had gained a few oz in tue despite having less intake but think that was due to this formula otherwise I would def change to a reflux formula!

[buttonbaby]

Had a review at the hospital today and DS gained weight…nearly 6 oz since fri which is great, he is still not getting much per day and struggling to get what I am into him but they are happy with he weight gain..thats thanks to the high calorie formula I’d say, they were going to prescribe meds (Ranitidine) for reflux in case that made a difference, though the consultant today wasn't very open to the fact DS may have silent relx, she siad "it doesn't just come out of nowhere", though in looking it up the last few days I read lots of times that the symptoms take a while to show, she is of the opinion he is just a poor feeder, despite me saying eh was doing well initially and was drinking more oz per day at 3 weeks then he is now, but when she looked him up he was too small for that medication! Do you know what weight/age they need to be for it? He has a Follow up in 2-3 weeks1 Hope your dd is doing  better at bedtime?

[Lolly]

{{HUGS}} welcome to the frustrating world of reflux in babies and Drs . What weight is he now? The chart I look at from a site in  NZ has the doses starting at 3kg (6lb 9oz), it's usually dosed at 2-4mg per kg x 2 per day or some Drs will dose at 1-3mg per kg for under 6 months.

Hmmm at the "just a poor feeder" surely there has to be a reason that a baby is a poor feeder - after all that's pretty much all they know to do at this age!

Yeah for the weight gain though! Let's hope it carries on!

Laura

[buttonbaby]

So frustrating, I was upset leaving, I kept getting smart answers back, Dr said “he was a poor feeder at first and that wasn’t due to reflux” but my point was, he wasn’t sucking well but came home sucking well and was feeding great until the sudden drop…as you said there HAS to be a  reason, they did a chest x-ray and that was clear!
Thant is weird about the weight thing as ds is now 7lb 6.
I was upset leaving, not for me and the struggle getting he food in but for the fact that as long as dd gains weight all is fine, he will due to the new formula even if he is not getting enough, but will just have to suffer in pain every day as Dr is only going by the weight gain, the more I read about silent reflux, the more I think he has it. Some of the symptoms I said he didn’t have initially he does now, crying after a lot/most of feeds as well as the others I mentioned. My plan initially was when he was of the right size/age I was going to ask for that med to be prescribed again.

Thank you once again for your take on the matter and advice!

[buttonbaby]

Oh the consultant today said if I did use Ranitidine I could not use gaviscon, is that the case?

[Lolly]

I've not heard that about ranitidine and gaviscon either . They do 2 different things, the only other thing would be to use carobel to thicken the feeds instead of gaviscon (that's all it does after all!) and give ranitidine.

I would try and video bad feeds when he is crying and refusing a lot to show them the next time they go, or arrange to feed him while they watch. You can also print out information about silent reflux, highlight all the symptoms he has and then ask why they DON'T think it's reflux given the info you are giving them.

Laura

[my3girlsjde]

I just wanted to drop off some {{{hugs}}}

E was a ftt, and it was so very hard. She had undiagnosed reflux and a severe allergy to milk. She had lost quite a bit before growing finally. She's still quite petite, although our paed has suggested that her natural growth may be to be a small child to begin with. It's unfortunately not that comforting when you have others tell you that growth isn't up to par though.

My LC did suggest to feed to sleep to help with growth. Although it's not a bw principle and I've run into some prop issues, I think it really worked. She ate so much more in a half daze and swaddled, and then we really started to see some good growth.

[buttonbaby]

Laura..great ideas, I will be doing all that!

Thanks too for that Liz, I was trying to avoid that initially but when ds is sleepy/relaxed he feeds best so now I use the cluster and dream feeds (if eh ahs settled for them..if nto he wont feed much) to get in the most amounts and make up for any bad feeds in the day…glad to hear of other who do that! Thanks for your msg. x

[buttonbaby]

Hi, Ds had 2 good days where I thought all was ok but as of 2 days ago he went back to being very hard to feed, its lie he is fighting with the bottle and is very upset after feeds, went back to GP today, she referred me to a gastrontologist as she said due to size she would be reluctant to prescribe the medication.Even if tests show he does not have relux I will be relieved to know at least I checked! Anyone I speak to says what worked for them is changing formula so once DS ahs caught up in weight I will consider that. The GP mentioned ranitidine today but a lot of parents have mentioned losec, just wondering do you know what the difference is between the two?

[Lolly]

Ok - here's your reflux med 101 (after 4 years it get's a bit easier ).

Basically ranitadine and losec both reduce acid in the stomach but in different ways. When we eat we produce histamine which triggers proton pump cells in the stomach to produce acid to aid digestion. Ranitadine reduces the amount of histamine the body produces so less of the proton pump cells are switched on. It greatly reduces acid but doesn't switch it off. Losec is one of the drugs known as proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) they actually switch off the proton pump cells so the stomach doesn't produce any acid. Neither do anything for the reflux action but it does stop it hurting and causing damage.

Ranitidine is the first drug of choice for babies because it's been used for a long time, is well tolerated and has few side effects. It is however very weight sensitive and most babies seem to need the max dose for it to be working and they can become too used to it so it stops working. PPI's can be prescribed for babies but usually only by specialists because it's not liscenced for babies/toddlers (mostly because of the age of children it would need to be tested on I think).

My two have only been on ranitidine, DS's reflux was never really controlled but we couldn't get anythign else prescribed for him. DD was put on losec but she had a reaction to it (very rare) so we had to switch back to ranitidine and it is actually working well for her.

They may not do any tests on him. Reflux is usually diagnosed on history and symptoms and a meds trial. If they don't respond to meds and fail to thrive then they will consider tests (in the UK anyway). Other countries will do things like a barium swallow. My GI pead who saw DS said it wasn't worth testing because a confirmation wouldn't change his treatment so why put him through a procedure that wouldn't change anything.

HTH and sorry thigns are not improving yet.

Laura

[buttonbaby]

Awh  thanks..you really know your stuff when it comes to reflux. Sounds like you and your lO’s went through a lot to finally come up with something that helps..so glad they did though..well at least for your dd, must have been hard for you not really getting your DS’s reflux controlled!

I had read reflux is diagnosed as you said but my gp mentioned they would do a barium swallow…just read up on it there and saw ds will need to  swallow a small amount of a chalky liquid Wondering if this is unpleasant for babies and if so thinking poor ds plus thinking he will prob spit it out!


MY gp has often said what she thinks the hospital will do when I am going and usually they don’t do what she thought so maybe they won’t do that test, but she thought due to his size they might

You have been such a help..thanks you!