Hi everyone,
Am so glad when i found this site -my daughter who is now nearly 5 mths old suffers bad acid reflux....she vomits all the time and is only taking 4oz bottles,far less than wot she should be taking....the paed doc has put her on raniditine but to be honest its not helping at all,just making her produce more mucus......its awful to watch her in pain like this...am doing all the usual,raising her up etc,but no easier...am dreading solids incase she doesnt keep them down.......please get in touch and maybe you can give me tips to keep me sane......nicola,aka yummy mummy....

WELCOME TO IRD!!!
There are a ton of different routes to go to help your daughter. Are you thickening her feedings? Adding rice cereal to her milk can reduce the reflux. There may be a med change, and/or dose increase needed. There are different reflux meds out there to help the reflux babies, PPI drugs like prevacid, nexium and zegerid, and prilosec are great. My son was on prevacid. They block the acid production in the stomach.

The drug that your baby is on (randitdine) is a h2 blocker, like axid, and zantac. Usually they need the ppi drugs along with that.

You may also want to ask for your child to have a pedi gi doc to see her, if you have to have a referal, if not you can always do an internet search and find one in your area.

Also, what are you feeding her? Alot of the reflux babies do better on hypoallerginic formulas, not only if they are allergic/and or intollerent to milk or soy but it is easier for their tummies to digest making less acid to reflux.

WELCOME AGAIN TO IRD!!

Thanks ever so much for replying to me...its so gd to make contact with other parents who are going through this stressful time......she is on cow and gate comfort milk which is already thickened and has pre biotics in it which is meant to help.....she takes the milk ok - just throws up most of it until the nxt feed......we wer at the ped last wk and he isnt worried as she is putting on weight....should i try solids early maybe....its a vicious circle about changing milk as ped said it probably make her sicker since she is used to this one.....hard to know....

Hi and welcome to IRD. I don't think it would hurt her to try some different formulas. We went through several before we found one that worked best for my son. If she has a problem with milk then that can cause a lot of throwing up and discomfort. It is better to try different formulas before going to stronger meds.

I hope you are able to find something to get your baby girl (what is her name btw?) feeling better.

I also think that the milk could be the problem, sometimes the thickened formula is basically cows milk formula with a thickener. It is proven that for refluxers hypoallergenic formulas work best, there are a range of them from ones from the pharmacy to ones that can be prescribed.

Basically in a hypo formula the proteins are more broken down so they are easier to digest, if they digest it quicker there is less for them to vomit up. With normal cows milk a lot of refluxers have a problem with digesting it so it sits for a while and then when they vomit they bring it all up. Also it makes them feel full longer.

Try the HA formula for a couple of weeks, then try thickening it if that doesn't work. You may also want to ask for a different med to zantac (ranitidine), there are ones called PPI's which are generally either prevacid or prilosec adn they work really well once you get the dosing sorted out.

Good luck!

Hi and welcome to IRD. I don't think it would hurt her to try some different formulas. We went through several before we found one that worked best for my son. If she has a problem with milk then that can cause a lot of throwing up and discomfort. It is better to try different formulas before going to stronger meds.

I hope you are able to find something to get your baby girl (what is her name btw?) feeling better.

i am scared to change her milk as the paed doc said it would make her sicker....do u really think it will help her...she called olivia by the way....the doc said it would only aggreavate her tummy more...im just so confused as to wot to do.....the vomit is pure yellow wen it comes up and the zantac is def not helping her........so hard to know wot to do...nicola

Nicola I have been dealing with GERD for a over three years now and in my expierince changing the milk generally helps most kids, if it is a hypoallergenic formula (and not lactose free, or soy etc...) then the results are pretty good. It sounds to me like the doctor may not know a lot about reflux so you could always try and find one that is better at diagnosing and treating it. Zantac works for most babies but not all, so you need a doctor who can get her on the right meds so that it works for her.

Good luck, please post any questions that you have.