Conference moira::parenting_v3

    I hope everything goes well, though I can offer no advice. My son was
    never diagnosed as such, but was a tremendous spitter after every
    feeding until he was 7 months old. My doctor opted not to explore it
    further since he continuously gained weight.  When we introduced solids
    at about 4-5 months, we began feeding him every 2 hours during the day,
    smaller meals. That way his stomach had food in it, but wasn't overly
    full.  The spitting did abate verrrrrry gradually over the next few
    months.
    
    again, best of luck,
    

My oldest boy (who now at 13 is taller than I am) spit up before meals, after 
meals, during meals, and in between meals.  He was very active and motion 
seemed to bring it on.  He was only 2.5 kg at birth and had gastro-intestinitis
at 5 weeks.  But he grew ok.  At 9 months, when we were gettting ready to take 
him to the U.S. I was thinking of sewing a plastic suit for him to wear on the
airplane.  I was so desperate, I couldn't imagine carrying enough clothing for 
a ten hour flight.  Two weeks before we left, he suddenly stopped.

I'd say, if they're gaining weight and otherwise healthy, what's a bit of
spitting up.  But, every case, is special and it's up to you and your doctor
to decide if it is worth it to put your child through the discomfort.

ccb

While understandable, I don't think the two previous replies know what Sandy is
talking about. We aren't talking about "spitting up" here. We are talking about
projectile vomitting several times a day.

My son is now 14 months. He has been doing this since he was about 4 months.
However, we didn't do much about it until he was close to 10 months because
we also thought it was just normal spitting up that he would outgrow. When
it got to the point where every meal was coming up, we had him tested.

In our case, they diagnosed him as having reflux and esophagitis. A real
Catch 22. The esophagitis is caused by the reflux. Acid from the stomach backs
into the esophagus and irritates it. The irritation causes the flap at the
bottom of your esophagus from working which allows the reflux to happen.

Esophagitis can be treated by any one of about 10 medications. And which one
works for each person is still a mystery. Chris is now on his 3rd. He has
improved a lot. He can now go days without a problem. But every once in
awhile he regresses and has a very bad day. 

He's been on this 3rd medication for about 3 weeks. They want to give it another
few weeks before the next, drastic step. The next step will be to feed a tube 
down each nostril, hook them to a monitor, and "watch" what is going on down
there for 24 hrs. And they send him home while he is on this. Any early ideas on
how to keep a 14 month old quiet for this one? :-)

Sandy, 

	Chris had the gastric emptying scan done last month. It is fairly
painless. They gave him the isotope in a bottle. He inhaled it since he hadn't
eaten all morning. They then use a scanning machine similar to an ultrasound
to take pictures. Chris never peeped. And the pictures verified the reflux.
The only effect seemed to be that he had pure white, soiled diapers for a 
day or so.

	Please send me mail or call me with any updates. We are still puzzled
and struggling with this too. It might help if we can share any info that may
help.

							Mark

    >We aren't talking about "spitting up" here. We are talking about
    >projectile vomitting several times a day.
    
    Yeah, like driving down the road in our pickup truck with Kat in
    her infant seat on the passenger side, and suddenly having several
    ounces of milk sprayed all over the truck's dash -- I couldn't
    even see the road.  I got to where I didn't travel without a
    change of clothing for myself as well as for Kat, plus towels and
    such for cleaning up.
    
    We didn't have to go through the gastric emptying test.  At the
    time (17 years or so ago), they had to watch on an x-ray device,
    and the doctor felt that since Kat was gaining weight (albeit
    slowly), wasn't throwing up more than once a day, and was
    otherwise healthy, the risks of the test itself outweighed the
    benefits of the information he might gain from it.  I'm glad you
    now have easier, safer tests to get the information you need, and
    more treatments once you do get an accurate diagnosis.  
    
    Kat didn't outgrow her problems so much as she learned to cope
    with it.  She tends to eat slowly, and eat several small meals. 
    If she eats too much, she will still throw up all over the place. 
    She also started vomiting less as she ate more table food and
    drank less milk.  She was very fond of bland absorbent foods like
    mashed potatoes and bread, and it didn't occur to me until just
    now that she probably liked them because they made her stomach
    less acid.  I always thought of her as a picky eater . . . 
    
    --bonnie

Neither was I talking about just "spitting up" although he certainly did
enough of that.  We're talking across the room here.  Fortunately, it just
stopped for us.

If I had not been a first time parent far from a "support" community I might
have figured out there was something wrong.  But, he gained weight, didn't
seem to have pain (except for colic up to three months) and quit by himself.

When he got gastro-intestinitis and had convulsions at 5 weeks, he did go back
to hospital.  Then he was on a diet of pureed carrots and black tea.  Milk
was particularly hard for him to take, including my own.  I had to stop 
breast feeding and put him on a special formula.

ccb 

    My son had the same problem of the projectile vomitting across the
    room.  We took him to the doctors and they did an upper gi and the
    emptying stomach scan and they found out that he had pyloricstinois
    (sp?)  which is the narrowing of the tube from the stomach to the small
    instense.  It is more common in first born males.  They did surgrey on
    him.  What they do is make the tube bigger.  He was in the hospital for
    two days and one night.  The doctor told me that is very common.
    He came out of everything just fine.  
    
    What a way to spend my first mothers day in the emergency room with
    doctors telling me my son is going to have to have surgrey.
    
    Everything is just fine now.  Its not a major surgrey.
    
    Della

    Thank you all for the information.  We went through the scan
    yesterday and are still waiting for the results. He did cry through
    most of it because they had him strapped to the table with the
    "camera" about 1/4" above him.  I don't think it was painful - he
    just wasn't used to it or very comfortable.  Nicholas has "spit-up"
    more than usual since he was born.  He continues to gain weight
    and we have a very hard time trying to track his vomitting, some
    days he does very well (only 2 or 3 times) other days - it's several
    times for each meal.  We just started him on food and it hasn't
    improved.  We give him carrots and 3 hours later he spits up
    orange... (that was scary the first time, especially when it
    was projectile - I don't want to give him peas or green beans!!).
    We have been through an ultra sound and they found he didn't have
    the pyloricstenosis (I can't spell it either.) Then the upper
    G.I. and now this one.  The Dr. said this one would tell them
    a lot of information and the next step discussed would be surgery.
    We have a lot of 'discussing' to do if they suggest that.  Our
    hope is that he grows out of with time, in the mean time, we
    change clothes alot and give guests a towel when they hold him!
    
    For medication he gets Zantac twice a day to reduce the acid in
    his stomach so it won't burn his esophegas and Raglan 4 times a
    day to help push the food out of his stomach faster.  We have
    alredy increased the dosage on both but see no change in keeping
    formula/food from coming up.  He's 5 1/2 months now - one Dr.
    said he could out-grow it as soon as 7 or 8 months - here's hoping!
    
    Thanks again,
    
    Sandy