Advice about Ear Tubes

[ArizonaGirl]

Hi all,

So DD is 20 months old and over the course of the last year has had at least 5 infections with 3 of them occurring since January. Seems to have fluid in her ears often, she has had too infections in the last 5 to 6 weeks.

We went to see the ENT today and of course her ears look great. He basically said it was up to us about whether we want to proceed with tubes, he was fine with going ahead and scheduling the procedure, but he also was fine with waiting and seeing if she gets another infection and then going ahead and scheduling. He was saying that sometimes it gets better in the summer.

I am so torn about what to do.

I don't want to put her through it if it is not necessary, but on the other hand I know our luck and think it is very likely that she will get another infection and then I will have just delayed the inevitable.

We are also going on vacation for a week in the middle of June and am afraid if we wait too long we won't be able to get in before our trip.

I was also kind of hoping that if we got her ears feeling better her sleep would improve because right now it is terrible. Like she is up at least 2 to 5 times every night terrible.

He said that they shouldn't be keeping her up right now because they look ok, but I kind of wonder if we have just gotten into the cycle of infection = crappy sleep, then I fix it with CIO after she is cleared by the Dr. and then like a week or two later she gets another infection and the cycle repeats itself :dizzy:.

I don't know what to do and DH is no help when it comes to this stuff because he just wants to defer to me.

I asked my parents what they think because they watch her during the week while I work sometimes and my Dad says wait and see and my Mom says to go ahead with the tubes.

I am rambling terribly here and if you have made it this far then :bowdown: , I am just so unsure what to do.

I guess I am looking for people's feelings on what they think and if anyone has had the procedure done and regretted it, or vice versa.

TIA

[PZMommy]

I would definitely get the tubes! It is such an easy procedure. Both of my boys were running around within hours of the procedure. They had ear infections off and on for months prior to the tubes. They also were not good sleepers. Their sleep improved dramatically once they got the tubes.

My older DS is now four and once his tubes fell out he had no issues. My youngest has lost one tube, and we will be replacing both tubes this summer since he has infections again since losing the one tube. I don't regret for second doing the tubes and wished we could have gotten them sooner.

[Simon]

Personally, I'd wait and see if she does better once cold/flu season is over. If she gets 2 more over the spring/summer or even if they re-start in the fall, then I'd go ahead. Two of my kids had ear tubes, although they had many more EIs than your Dd (more like 10-12 in a year). I am often pro-surgery if it can end long-term medication use but I think I'd wait longer in your case. Plus, ear tubes don't guarantee the end of EIs. It worked for my 2 kids but not at all for our close friends. Their Ds continued to get frequent EIs and to need abx.

Many kids out grow EIs as they get physically larger. How is her speech?

[buddyleebaby]

Dd2 has had ear tubes twice. I will say that for us, tubes alone were not enough to solve her issues (frequent EIs and temporary hearing loss). She had EIs even with the tubes in, and they fell out pretty quickly. So I do kind of regret that surgery, only because she was so little to go under general anesthesia for something that didn't work. Logically, I know that there was no way of knowing that ahead of time and had it worked I wouldn't have regretted it, but I still have mommy guilt over it.

The second time around she had her adenoids removed at the same time. The recovery was no harder (I actually think it was easier due to the anti-nausea meda they gave her that time around) and it completely resolved her issues. Even after the second set of tubes fell out, the ear infections and fluid build-up did not return. I wish we had done the adenoids in the first place.

eta: Our Doctor had her on Flonase for a couple of months before he went ahead with surgery.

[MSWR0319]

We had a similar situation with DS. He fought straight from about 6 months till a year (ear infection, then just fluid, then ear infection, then clear, then fluid,etc). At that point (April of last year) the pediatrician said if it didn't clear in the summer, we'd go to the ENT. He didn't get an ear infection all summer, but come Sept we started all over again. We went to the ENT who said, yes time to do it.His ear drums had lived a very hard life. When she came out of surgery she said the fluid in his ears was so bad and had been there a very, very long time. She mentioned it was probably why his speech wasn't where it needed to be and that we may need therapy. I feel so horrible for not getting them sooner. Since the tubes (Dec 13) he has not had one ear infection. He has had a cold and it doesn't go to his ears anymore! He just started speech therapy because his speech was at a 12 month old level vs his age (just turned 2). The poor guy could have been able to communicate better if we had gotten those tubes in sooner. She said it was hard to tell how much fluid was in there until they pulled it out and I shouldn't beat myself up, but still.

[lhafer]

If you don't want to do tubes just yet, you might want to try allergy testing. I had tubes put in my dd1 when she turned one due to constant ear infections and fluid that wouldn't go away. It helped immensely. But she also has bad allergies and since she was 6 months old.

[AngB]

I actually took DS2 to a chiropractor for a few visits in order to try to avoid tubes...and he hasn't had an EI since (early Jan.), even with several colds.

The main reason I wanted to avoid them was concerns about GA and I have read some articles that suggest kids who have gone under GA before the age of 3 show a higher tendency of having learning disabilities later.

I personally would wait but that's me.

[ArizonaGirl]

Speech = she has a large vocabulary, and the ent said her hearing was fine, but I know she often has fluid in there.

Allergies = she may have allergies she may not, her eyes have that dark circle allergy look, but that could also be the fact that she sleeps like crap.

[BDKmom]

I will first tell you what I know as a healthcare provider, then tell you what I did as a mom. I am an audiologist in an ENT office. I have seen hundreds of children over the years come in for tubes. I rarely (as in can probably count on one hand) see complications after tubes. Occasionally a child's ear infections are so bad that the don't stop after the tubes, and the drainage actually pushes the tubes out and they have to have several sets or continue antibiotics after tubes, but that is such an infrequent occurrence, that I can probably still come up with the names of the 4 or 5 kids I have seen that happen to over the past 15 years. Almost every parent who brings their child in for post op is extremely happy with the outcome and reports that sleep has improved, speech has taken off, mood is better, walking is better, etc. I always swore that if my kids needed tubes, I would not hesitate.

Then DD started having ear infections. She had her first one at 6 mos, right around Thanksgiving. Another right before Christmas that may have just been the first one that never cleared. A third in Feb that took 3 rounds of antibiotics, including rocephin injections to get it to clear up. That's when the ped started talking tubes, but it was mid march, so I thought I would wait and see how she did since we were coming out of winter. Then came another in April and one in May, and I finally gave in and got the tubes. Not a second of trouble since then. Every infection I thought would surely be the last one, then would come another, and I really regret not doing the tubes in March.

With that experience, I would say get the tubes, since you are having sleep issues and have travel plans coming up, especially if your plans involve flying. Ear troubles and flying are not a good mix.

Good luck with whatever you decide.

[acmom]

We had a very similar situation. DS had 6+ ear infections from Sept to April, several needing more than one course of antibiotics to clear. Got the referral to ENT in May (he was 11 months) and ears looked ok the day of the appt so he said it was up to us whether to do it in May or wait and see what happened in the warmer months. We ended up going forward with the surgery for several reasons. While not truly delayed in speech and language, he was on the later end of typical development in this area. He was also having some sleeping and feeding issues and it was unclear if maybe they were ear related or related to his diagnosis of reflux. The constant antibiotics for the ear infections were also messing with his GI system at times. We were also due to move to a new state shortly and DH (who is a physician) really liked the pediatric ENT and major childrens hospital in the city we lived in at the time.

After the surgery, the ENT came out and told us that it was no question a good choice as there was significant fluid that had been there for a while. He had maybe 3 more ear infections in the next 2.5 years with the tubes in and 2 of those were treated with drops only. Maybe coincidental, but his speech and language development picked up a lot that summer after the tubes.

He had surgery last winter to take them out (bc they had been in over 2.5 years). Both the insertion of the tubes and the removal were very short procedures (less than 10 minutes) and he only had a mask, no IV. He recovered from both very quickly and was back to his normal activity level by the afternoon. We are waiting to see now if we have to put a new set in, as he has had a couple infections again since they were taken out.

Good luck with your choice. I think it will work out either way.

[azzeps]

If it is not affecting her hearing/speech, I would take the "wait and see" approach. I'd also take her to a chiropractor to help get the fluid cleared. Also, probiotics wouldn't be a bad idea just due to all the antibiotics she's been on, and to help build immunity and fight whatever may come along.

[Jen841]

My son did not qualify for tubes until he was five pictures old and it was the best thing we did for him. For number two I wanted to tubes for him because he always had fluid and he ended up with speech delays later that I say were due to the fluid. I wish number two was able to get tubes he always missed the cut off and had cleared ears when the time came

[Snow mom]

My DD had more infections and was a bit younger but we had the same decision of waiting to see if the end of cold season would stop the infections. We also took away her pacifier at this time because we wanted to try all the "easy" things before surgery. Then her ear drum ruptured for the first time about three weeks after our ENT appointment and we called the same day to set up the tubes. I did regret waiting on the tubes but of course this was an issue of hindsight being 20/20. We were happy with the tubes once it was done.

[georgiegirl]

I'm pretty sure we are going to get tubes for Ds2. He's had 3 ear infections since January, and he's having surgery for an undescended testicle in June, so we might as well since he will already be under. We have an ENT consult in early may. Hopefully the ENT will agree, but I don't see why not. Our ped thinks it's a no brainier, since DS has gotten an ear infection each time he was sick, and he will only get more when he's a toddler and exposed to more germs.

[ssand23]

Two of my 4 kids had ear tubes and we were very happy with them. With both kids we didn't wait and went forward with surgery as soon as it was suggested. I'm very glad that we didn't wait and we've had zero regrets. The surgery was very simple and it's day stay so you are back home that afternoon.

My daughter got her ear tubes at 15 months. She's 11 years old now and only 2 weeks ago had her first ear infection since the ear tubes she got back in 2003! My son has also had great results with his ear tubes. On the flip side, both DH and I had chronic ear infections as kids and neither of us had ear tubes. My husband now has hearing problems that are from his chronic infections as a child and my chronic infections affect my balance still today. He and I wish we had the ear tubes as kids.