Hi, I am new to this board an am glad to know that I can talk to others who are experiencing what I am. My daughter is 9weeks old and was recently switched to previcid (she has been on zantac and pepcid) it has only been 2 days. We were given pills to dissolve in water and give to her 15 minutes prior to a meal. This has proven to be very difficult because she has trouble drinking water (its not thick enough) and most of the meds come right back up. So my question is how is everyone els giving there child previcid? TIA Mary Ann

Hi Mary Ann and welcome to the boards,
Unfortunately, I can't help you with your question (as my son who has reflux has only ever been on domperidone), but there's lots of members here who I'm sure will be able to. I just wanted to say hello and welcome and I look forward to getting to know you better :D

Hi there and welcome!

Unfortunately, my son was misdiagnosed until he was 1 1/2 years old. By the time he started on Losec and Domperidone, we were able to give them to him in a tsp. of applesauce or other pureed fruit. Perhaps the Prevacid could be made into a suspension. Your doctor and/or pharmacist should be able to help with that.

Hi,
My son Jake has been on prevacid since he was about 3 months old. In the earlier months we would mix is with a bottle but only put in 1-2 ounces so we knew he was getting it. Then we realized we saw the granules at the bottom of the bottle, since it is extended release they would not disolve. Now we give it to him in applesauce. Oh yeah ,we give him prevacid 15mg packet in the powder form. We had to call our insurance at first b/c CVS said it was not covered but it was. You should see if you doctor can prescribe it to you in the powder, it also has a sweet smell and taste to it so your little one might was to eat it more. Let us know what happens.
Lisa

Hi we use a product called Cara Cream to mix our Prevacid..it ensures correct dosing while keeping the total volume to administer very small. the web site is www.chocobase.com You can order on line or have a compounding pharmacy do it for you. Save a lot of waste and vomiting..My daughter has used this for her little one for several months now . She first used Zantac, but no results..the prevacid is giving the baby some relief and now she can eat a little more with each feeding. At first 1 oz was all she could tolerate, now we are up to 4 oz and today she tried solid spoon feeding. She is now 5 months and has reached 11 pounds, and best of all she can smile and laugh!
Look up the site...its great stuff for refluxers! They will answer questions also when you call or write them
G-ma Ginny

My daughter takes prevacid, but it is Liquid form. I thought for infants that it all came liquid, but my pharmasists stated it is different with all insurances what they will cover.

Our insurance covers it in pill form, but for the Liquid, we had to get a waiver from our Doctor to the Insurance company for prior approval and they only would do it since she had already tried other medications.

check with your pharmasist and Doctor. You should be able to get in in liquid form.

When you talk of liquid prevacid, do you refer to the granuals that you can mix with an ounce of water to make a delayed release oral suspension?? The packets come in 15 mg or 30 mgs. This volume of liquid can be a problem for tiny refluxers. I find no oral liquid form listed any place. Some pharmacies will mix the granuals with sodium Bicarb. to make a solution that is pH balanced and the gran. are totally disolved. Has a salty taste and still a bugger volume of the liquid must be ingested to get the correct dose of drug. Once again a problem if the baby can only tolerate small oral feedings....the caracream is still the easiest way we have found to give a high dose of drug suspended in a very tiny amt of liquid. Presently we give 3ml (about a half tsp) which containes 10.5 mg of the drug prevacid..we do this twice a day. Pills are used to make the solution so insurance covers the pills without question...some insurances cover the caracream/chocobase also. good stuff!

Hi

I started my baby on prevacid young too. They gave me liquid at first but nothing changed, my ped said it had to be pill...pellets, I have to devide the pills in two, and give her half. I put in in a baby spoon with water, but you can use formula, and try to put in the back of her mouth but not too far so she would gag! Its hard, and I hate it!! But that<s the only thing I could do, since the ped didn<t even know herself!!

Goodluck!

Originally we gave Daniel Prevacid in capsule form. We had to open it and sprinkle half of the little beads on solids. Even though he was about nine months old, he wasn't eating solids very well, and adding the new texture of the medicine pretty much put a stop to even the small amount he was eating.

So the doctor switched him to the solutab form of Prevacid. We break it in half and put it in his cheek where it's supposed to dissolve "instantly." Ha! We'd give it to him first thing in the morning so he wouldn't throw up when he'd gag and retch. In the past week, however, he's learned to handle it without crying or gagging. I think that's because he's suddenly more willing to eat solids. But we still give it to him first thing so we're sure he won't spit up.

Becky

hi,
my daughter is not on Prevacid but does have problem with taken liquids that are to thin. What I do is I drop a bit of thickened formula into a nipple then add the med slowly as she suck just the nipple part without the bottle. That way she is getting all the med. I hope maybe this will help.

zapsmom

My son has been on prevacid since birth. The ped at the hospital gave me liquid prevacid, but my ped said that it doesn't last as long as the time released pill. I had the same problem giving him the pill. What I did was pour out the pill in a small bowl, wet my finger and pick up some of the pills, then let him suck on my finger. I did that until it was gone. But what worked best was pouring the prevacid into the side ofhis mouth and then immediately breast feeding him. After I gave up trying to bf because he would nurse, pull away, scream, and arch, he was begining to eat cereal so I just put it in that.

Until recently prevacid worked for us, now at 8 mos. he has gotten worse, and I don't know what we are going to do.
Rebecca

Hello to everyone...I hope I can really help all of you!!!! My daughter is 6 months old. We have been battleing the reflux since she was about 6 weeks old. Kensey is on Prevacid as well. We have a compounding pharmacy make her medicine. (they usually don't take insurance...you have to submitt the claim to your insurance provider.) They make it sweet and thick for me. The pharmacist explained to me that little children have a PH level in their tummies that prevent them from absorbing the medicine properly. So they mix something like baking soday in with the dissolved Prevacid. It nuetralizes the PH in the stomach and allows the body to absorb the medicine. My pharmacy uses simple syrup to flavor my daughters medicine. It comes in a berry flavor and a bananna cream. Good luck to all of you ...and I hope this helps!

Sincerely,
Kelly and Kensey :P

I hope this helps you out -- our son has been on Prevacid for some time know. Originally we were sprinkling the beads from the capsule onto yogurt to get him to eat it but that proved to be very difficult with much of it being spit back out. Recently we saw another specialist for feeding/reflux who advised us to dissolve the Prevacid Solutab in a little water and then give that to him (we use a dropper or syringe first thing in the morning). We are able to get it all into him and I think (hope) we are going to see results.

We are able to get it all into him and I think (hope) we are going to see results.
I hope so too, Vic! Good luck. When you get a chance, we'd love if you could stop by and introduce yourself and your child.

Hi Everyone!

I've also got a question that I hope some of you will be able to help me out with. I've also got some suggestions for the others posting to this message.

Here's the situation. My little 'Peewee' is only 3 weeks old this coming wednesday. She almost weighs 8 lbs. She had respiratory problems in the hospital and just after coming home (c-section) she was diagnosed with Larengomalasia (floppy larenx) that is aggrevated with her GER. We have a great doc though and she's been on zantac, but it hasn't been working and her reflux is getting worse. She is so obviously in pain when she eats and after eating, but does a valient effort to keep the formula down. She does have episodes of severe spit-up and dribbles a lot of formula out of her mouth during feedings. The problem is the pain, her larenx and respiratory issues and the inflammation she has in her throat (it's pretty bad) and the aspiration into her lungs. She's now taking 1cc of zantac 3 times a day, but it's not working. Our next option is prevacid, my question is, how much are you guys giving? Our doctor isn't available on the weekend, but I know it only comes in 15mg at the lowest, which is prescribed for 60 lbs and under. Since Melanie is only about 8lbs, it just seems like such a huge weight spread.

Now, my four year old daughter was the WORST at taking medicine, so perhaps I can help some of you with my experience in this area. She was very skilled at detecting even the tiniest amount of meds no matter what we mixed it in and how sneaky we were at the dosing. Your best option is working with a compounding pharmacists. They can work miracles!! Otherwise, for older children, mixing the medicine with thier favorite food is the best. Make sure you do it when they're really hungry. For babies, we found it was difficult to keep our daughter from spitting the medicine right back up. Especiallyif it was squirted into her mouth. The best thing we found was the little pacifier dispecer. You can put the medicine into the pacifier and the baby will suck it right out.

I was told that you coudln't mix prevacid with formula, yet some of you are doing this. Is this true??

Thank You!!! Such a frustrating time...especially with a tiny baby!!

Laura.

Hi Laura and welcome! Sorry I can't help you with your prevacid question. My son has never been on that medication, but I did want to welcome you anyway. Hope to see you around!

I don't know about mixing Prevacid with formula, I do think really advise against that, but our pharmacy mixes it into a suspension for us with sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) and water. It seems to work well, she's been on this for close to two years, last year she had a scope that showed no damage so I assume it's doing it's job.

As for the dosage, the doctor really would have to answer that question but there are really very little babies on it (Shae was on Prilosec at only about 8-10 lbs), so I don't think the dosage will be a problem.

Welcome to the boards, thanks for the tips on med dispensing! I look forward to getting to know you.

Regarding dosage, my son takes half of a 15mg Prevacid solutab per day. He weighs 21 pounds.

Sometimes he spits it (or part of it) back out or even spits it up, and our doctor (the ped GI) said to give him another dose because it's more important that he get his meds than the risk of giving him too much.

My son is 6 months and just started Prevacid solutabs. You can either put the tab on the tongue and let it dissolve. I find it easier to dissolve it in water, put it in a syringe and then give it to him. The beads stick to plastic so I put the tab in a metal tablespoon and add 1 -2 cc of water until it dissolves. Then I draw it up in a syringe. I then give it to him. The beads tend to stick to the plastic syringe. So then I keep redrawing up water into the syringe, swirl it, give it again and repeat until all the beads are out. The solutabs are strawberry flavored so he likes it. According to TAP (the manufacturer) you are not supposed to cut or chew it as it disrupts the beads which can inactivate the medicine. According the TAP pharmaceuticals it should be given 30 min prior to a high protein meal, ie. milk. You can read a good string on this on the PAGER site http://www.reflux.org/reflux/pagdscfa.nsf/ec04cf4dfb17bc4085256dcb00671924/DA4B73D80B3492E785256ECA0046623F?OpenDocument. I would check with your doctor as well. Hope this helps.

My daughter has been on Prevacid 15 mg since she was 1. She weighed 15 pounds and tolerated it well.

My grandson, Braydon, was just put on Prilosec 4 days ago. We were told by the nurse at the Children's Hospital (Dayton, Ohio) that we could mix the 4 ml liquid Prilosec with 10 cc Nutramigen formula. My daughter is starting this tonight, so I will let you know how it goes. Hope this helps some. Good Luck.