Acid Reflux - Little Rock,AR

M.,
I'm not a Dr., but when my daughter had reflux, she was spitting up a fair amount. I would think that would be a factor. I have heard, however, that reflux can cause a cough from the acid coming into the throat, but I don't know about congestion. I thought all newborns were congested a fair amount of the time, along with hiccups all the time. I would just suction her nose and try to keep her comfortable. Also a cool mist humidifier may help. Maybe you should just try a second opinion???
Good luck,
W.

You maynot believe this, but I have acid reflux too and this older lady told me that mustard helps to prevent acid reflux just a teaspoon of plain mustard so thats what I do now. So if it's acid reflux or not just try a little mustard and see if she gets better. It sounds like alleges to me.

I thought I was the only one that had a child with this very same problem. She was diagnosed with acid reflux when she was 2, and she is now 7. She gets all stuffy, like she has a cold, but it is acid reflux. The Dr. put her on Prevacid, which is medication for acid reflux. One time she even threw up. Antibiotics make acid reflux worse! It is hard to know when her reflux is acting up verses having a cold. She had her tonsils removed at a very young age before we knew she had acid reflux. That was the worst experience ever, b/c the reflux was burning her raw throat from where her tonsils were removed. She would not eat or drink. Ask your doctor if you should tilt the crib, b/c that will help a lot. Putting something under her pillow will not work, but tilting the crib will. It will keep the acid in the stomach. Good luck!

yes. i'd make sure to raise her head in her crib when sleeping either with a big book under her mattress or try finding a wedge...if she doesn't get better see if maalox or mylanta will work or the dr. might prescribe prevacid or zantac. my daugther had it but spit up all the time, even through her nose and it was very painful for her and awful for us. you're suppose to hold them upright for 30 minutes after eating as well. i might check and see if you could take her to a GI doctor or even an ENT dr. I work for an ENT dr and we see this often but they might want to make sure she's not aspirating (liquid going to her lungs) since it keeps coming up. good luck.

My daughter has acid reflux as well and she never ever spit up. I find it interesting that alot of the other ladies say their kids were stuff because mine is always stuffy too. She is stuff on the medicine.

It doesn't sound like acid reflux to me.

My no2 son had a stuffy nose from the day he was born. Then sometimes it would just run green slime for days on end. There wasn't much we could do about it. He used to drool like a running fountain too. He eventually grew out of it. It never seemed to make him distressed.

When we put him down for naps or at bedtime we just made sure that the bed was slightly elevated at the head end. (A couple of bricks under the bed legs - or a couple of towels under the mattress to keep it elevated.)

I mentioned the stuffy nose/green slime to the doctor and put it down to enlarged adnoids and said that he would eventually grown into them, and he did when he was about 3.

As for the rice cereal - it is my personal opinion that she is a bit to young to go onto cereal.

As for the hiccups - babies hiccup alot and is not a symptom of acid reflux. We used to say that when they hiccupped they were growing.

Hiccups are a normal part of baby life & do not indicate acid reflux. IMHO: I don't think your baby has acid reflux from your description and having just searched for more info. I also disagree with the cereal idea as your baby is really too young for cereals.

My child had a lot of congestion when she was a baby and it turned out she has had allergies since birth. She is on meds year around to help control the environmental allergies, but it gets really difficult for her the same 3 months of every year when her seasonal allergies kick in.

put the crib up on a small slant so the food stays in her stomach.

I've never heard of congestion being acid reflux -- does she think the liquid coming out of her nose is stomach "juices"? If so, they would make her nose very very sore and red due to those "juices" are a strong acid! Hmmmm.... try a different doctor!

My daughter had reflux but not those particular symptoms. I put cereal in every bottle and made sure to have her elevated at all times. This made a world of difference. Like I said she didn't have those symptoms but what does it hurt to try. If it doesn't work at least you know and you can move on to something else. Good luck.

Well, some babies who have acid reflux don't actually spit up; this is the silent form; it only comes up part-way.

Congestion IS very common among newborns and very young babies. BUT if you are feeding her dairy-based formula, it could be that. Dairy causes congestion, and some people are more sensitive to it than others. Try switching to a soy-based formula. Make it organic if you can, because most soy in the United States is genetically modified. (It's even worse in the case of dairy, because the cows are being fed genetically modified soy and corn - another crop that is genetically modified nearly across the board now - and the genetically modified proteins bio-accumulate and can pass through the milk; this, and dairy cows are injected with genetically modified bovine growth hormone to increase milk production. All of these things are profit-driven without a lot of concern for people's health. They do bare-bones safety studies of extremely questionable quality to get their product on the market. In short, go with good, old-fashioned straight-up organic when possible, especially when it comes to soy, dairy, and corn. I could tell you about other crops you want to buy organic, but that's another subject. PM me if you're interested.)

Anyway. Try a can of soy and see if her congestion clears up within about a week (it can take a few days to a week to see the difference). I bet you it will!

The severe congestion around Christmas was probably a result of the new addition to her diet. The cereal, while still very wet, is drier than formula or breast milk. What I learned from Ruth Yaron's Super Baby Food (a fantastic book, please get it!) was, when you feed a baby a meal of solids, you need to offer the baby a little water, too. This is also important not only to keep them from getting congested, but also on the other end, to prevent constipation.

Of course, she might also have had a bit of a cold.

Hiccups - lots of them - are very common among babies. Lots as in, oh, a couple to several times a day. Hiccups are not a symptom of reflux.

I'm surprised that the doctor approved feeding solids so early. All the studies show that even four months of age is still early to be starting a baby on solids. Most doctors that I've talked to - and my mother, a nutritionist who sees young babies at WIC - have told me that closer to six months is safer. You might want to put it on hold for at least another month to help prevent food allergies in her. If it can be prevented by just waiting a month, by all means, wait a month!! For her sake, and yours. Food allergies are a pain in the neck in the best case, and fatal in the worst.

Here's why it causes food allergies: at this age, anything other than breastmilk or formula is hard for their digestive system to deal with, and this stress on the digestive system can lead to a strong reaction to certain proteins - this reaction is a food allergy. How my pediatrician put it was, there's no harm in waiting another month, but there could be harm in starting solids early.

Does this doctor say that the cereal will help with the reflux? Because it is "heavy" and will sit in the stomach better without coming up? If so, this is completely wrong.

Send me a private message about any other issue that might be motivating you to use cereal at this time. (Are you trying to get her to sleep through the night? That's another old wives' tale! It doesn't work and might actually make night waking worse.) Maybe I can suggest an alternative to feeding her cereal that will resolve whatever problem it is that is making you want to use cereal. You have options!

To tell it to you straight, the advice you're getting doesn't sound very good. Maybe you should find a different doctor for your baby. It seems pretty common, from my experience so far, that doctors still hold onto a lot of outdated "wisdom" that has been proven to be old wives' tales, and they just haven't caught up with newer research. It's like they are going with what they learned way back in med school. Hair stylists need to take classes every few years or so to catch up with new hair styles. You would think doctors would have to take classes to keep up with research for the sake of our health! But, anyway, it sounds like you and your baby are on the short end of this situation. Set up appointments with other doctors in different pediatric practices/offices and see if you click better with someone else. These interview visits should be free for you, but sometimes aren't.

Good luck! Hope to hear from you!

L.

I have a 2 yr old daughter and she has acid reflux like myself but she would spit up alot. It doesn't sound like Acid Reflux to me. If it is acid reflex they should have given you some liquid Zantac. When my daughter got congested I used the vicks plug in for babies, put blankets under her mattress so her head is propt up, and put vicks on her chest so it would open her nose up and help it drain. Good luck and she gets better. We are going thru it now also.

From my own experience, here is my suggestion and perception of what you are explaining to us.

First of all, nurse your baby holding the infant in a semi-upright position so as to NOT clog the little nose. Second, feed the infant with calmness. Don't rush! Relax yourself, if necessary by enjoying a small glass of wine before the feeding. This was the doctor's suggestion to me many many years ago. My baby is now nearing 28 yrs old! Whew, time flies!

If you¡re busy thinking of what you have to do in the house, or worrying about cooking dinner, or with anything else on your mind besides the task at hand which is feeding the baby, the infant senses your tension. This creates anxiety in the infant while eating making it harder to digest properly the milk and sometimes making it difficult to burp afterwards. Especially if you are impatient while burping the baby, he/she may find it difficult to bring up the air bubbles swallowed while hurrying through the drinking process.

I'm shocked to hear the doctor saying to give Rice Cereal to such a young child, especially as solution for what he considers may be reflux! This makes no sense from my perception of what you're explaining to us. Cereals too early on in the infant's life make the babies more susceptible to allergies. It's best to hold off on the cereals and introducing other foods until the child reaches no less than 9 months of age.

The mother's milk is the most nutritious for the infant and quite filling if the infant is allowed to nurse comfortably without being rushed. The rushing, drinking so quickly, is what creates the air bubbles and hence the reflux. Although it is true that acid reflux has been diagnosed by many as being a condition to be treated in various ways such as changing formulas.

Good luck. Follow your heart, if you still have problems continuing seeing your physician or change doctors if you are not satisfied.

My daughter whom is a year old. Appears to have acid reflux. She doesnt have the symptoms you discribed, but you can tell that she has a reflux about once a day, she coughs and chokes, her eyes water. It was pretty scary, but she NEVER spits up. Her doctor said that as long as it isnt making her spit up and over time subsides, then no need for worry, she has done this as long as I can remember, very possible her entire year of life.

My son is almost 3 months old and he was diagnosed with acid reflux very early on. We've had problems with formula (we started with Nestle Good Start) and then switched to a formula for colic (Nutramigen by Enfamil...even though my son wasn't colicky!). His symptoms included LOTS of burps, spitting up with every bottle, very agitated during feeding times like he's in pain (arching his back, searching for the bottle but then crying when it gets into his mouth). It got to the point where he would pretty much refuse to eat. My pediatrician prescribed infant Prevacid solutabs, which dissolve in water and then you give them to your child with a syringe. Sometimes it helps, sometimes it doesn't. I was also told to add rice cereal, and began that when my son was probably only a month old. I started only doing about a teaspoon in a 4-ounce bottle in the morning and at night. The point of the rice cereal is twofold: (1) it thickens in the stomach making there less room for acid, and (2) it can help babies gain weight because it has more calories (my son had difficulty gaining the "appropriate" amount of weight early on). I've now started the rice cereal in every bottle.

I think some doctors are just hell-bent on the acid reflux diagnosis for any concerns we have, which is frustrating for us. I will say that my son also had that stuffy nose thing, and my pediatrician said it has a lot to do with the fact that they are babies and have baby-sized nostrils. :-) Of course, it then became a full-blown cold. I'm actually going to change pediatricians in the new year. The current guy who has made all of these diagnoses has made a couple of errors, including prescribing ADULT medication for my son, so I'm trying a new one.

Also, keep in mind that if you are slightly unsure, go back to your regular pediatrician for a second opinion. He/she might think differently.

Hope your daughter feels better!

first of all a stuffy nose sounds like alligeries acid reflux has to do with the top of your stomach not the nose I don't think I would got to that doctor again good luck

My 2nd child had reflux when he was a baby and it was awful - he screamed nonstop for the first 3 months of his life until we finally got him on the right medication that worked for him. I would go back and see your regular doctor because a congested nose doesn't sound like any symptom of reflux I have ever seen. Also, I think that prilosec and medications really help better than rice cereal if it really is reflux. I really think she would be screaming or acting in pain if it really is reflux. When I say he screamed nonstop I am not exaggerating - I am still traumatized by his reflux 2 years later - I hope for your sake that is not reflux!! Good luck figuring it out!

yep. sounds just like my daughter. she was snorty and congested sounding from birth, and then one day she was sleeping with her mouth open on my lap and i heard her hiccup and saw the milk rise up in her throat and go back down. she was put on medication at about 2 months. she didn't spit up much, and was huge and rolly-polly, but she was also exclusively breastfed, which our dr said made all the difference in the world. if she seems ready for cereal, swallowing and all, i guess go with what the dr says, but cereal is hard on them, and if she isn't sp[itting up or seeming in too much pain i wouldn't do it at every meal. i will say we were on meds til 15 months, and her reflux still seems to come and go at times. we really avoid processed foods, and horrible stuff like hot dogs or chips can make her throw up, even at three.

My daughter had reflux and didn't spit up. We put her on liquid zantax prescribed by thr Dr. and it worked wonders. Don't worry. This won't last too long.

My daughter had reflux and it was a lot of tummy aches and spitting up. Hiccups are part of it, but I'm not sure I would call it reflux just from that. If it were me I'd ask for a second opinion before putting her on meds.