Would you give her the antibiotics?
schmoodle
member
Took Boodle into convenient care today to check for an ear infection since our pedi isn't open until Tuesday and she slept badly again last night and is SUPER congested with weird colored snot.
NP said right ear looked fine, left one she looked at twice and then, still with equivocation, said it was looking a little red/dull, and would probably be infected by Monday. She prescribed amoxicillin.
I'm not crazy about giving antibiotics generally because I think they can tend to be overused and if not needed can lead to developing harder to fight infections due to more resistant bacteria. But I also don't want my baby girl to be in pain if she DOES develop the infection - and if she definitely had an ear infection I wouldn't think twice, but I don't think it's obvious that she has one based on the NP's advice. Another wrinkle is I'm concerned about maintaining our nursing relationship, she already is worse each day, I'm on antibiotics which worries me re: thrush (also taking probiotics but I'm not comfortable giving them to her) and I feel like if we give them to her too is a perfect cocktail for thrush and ending our ability to nurse/pump.
Thoughts? I was thinking wait till Monday by which time this tooth will almost certainly have broken through, and see if she's better or not and if not, it's probably safe to assume the ears are bugging her too. DH says maybe take her back to her regular doc next week (but that's super hard to coordinate with work schedules and the like esp. since I already have doc appts the following week that will make me miss some work and have to rearrange my and nanny's schedule). I could have the nanny take her but it's SO difficult to do that kind of stuff with both kids and I hate to give her tasks that I wouldn't want to do myself...
Re: Would you give her the antibiotics?
I am as anti-antibiotic as you are...but I'd give them to her. It most likely won't hurt...and it will help the ear and the upper respiratory infection and make her feel better all the way around. She won't develop a resistance from just one round of abx, and she sounds pretty miserable.
The thing is this, ear infections can get worse really rapidly...and if it is starting now, that ear will most likely be in bad shape by next week.
Also, as far as what we learned in nursing school, the probiotics are perfectly safe. They are the exact same gut flora as what she already has...but need to be replaced during/after antibiotic therapy.
I'm curious as to why you aren't comfortable giving them to her? Caroline gets probiotics all the time, but if you've read something I haven't, I'd love to see it...
No matter what, I hope she feels better as soon as possible!
I haven't done any personal research on it, just based on the fact that my OB didn't want me to take them when pregnant because they aren't strictly regulated, so I applied the same reasoning as when she was a fetus to now. I'm sure they're safe, I'm just psycho about stuff like that (I don't even like to take tylenol or give it to my kids unless it's a very clear need).
"When it comes to sleeping, whatever your baby does is normal. If one thing has damaged parents enjoyment of their babies, it's rigid expectations about how and when the baby should sleep." ~ James McKenna, Ph.D., Mother Baby Behavioral Sleep Center, University of Notre Dame
i would probably give them to her--i'm chicken about dealing with the sleep disruptions and general chaos that can ensue from DS not feeling well.
i hope things get better with nursing. i know nursing struggles are SO stressful. =(
I would NOT give them. Research has proven that most ear infections are viral and antibiotics would be useless. Abx are extremely overprescribed for ear infections.
Plus, I would never give abx for something that MIGHT get infected as opposed to something that definitely is.
I hope she feels better.
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