Baby constantly sick....

[strawberry4]

DD turned 9 mo old yesterday. She has been sick since mid-January. She has had ear infections, colds and a cough. She had tubes placed in her ears last week because of the ear infections. She has had a cold/cough since January. It seems she is getting one on top of the other. During this time, she has run a low grade temp in the low 100's (100.3, 100.4). She did have a fever this past weekend that went as high as 103. I took her to the weekend clinic at her dr's office and the on-call doc said her lungs were clear and it was not in her lungs. Hmmm. I hear her up coughing all night long, I did not agree. He did a wbc count and it came back normal except that she was fighting a virus. Pretty much the advice I was given was that we had to wait it out as it is an upper respiratory infection.

Her cough is so bad that she vomits 2-3 times a day. She has no appetite and is only drinking 15oz a day. She won't eat her baby food. While I have not weighed her, she looks like she has lost some weight. Her legs don't seem as chubby and her face looks skinnier. Her little eyes have black circles under them. It just makes me sad because I know she does not feel well and I am doing all I can to make her feel better.

She has her 9 mo well check later this week and I hope to get some answers. Has anyone else had anything like this happen (where they won't get better). While I want to trust the doctor was right in his diagnosis, my mommy intuition says not to trust what he said. For what it is worth, this past January I had my DS at the same clinic and the dr said his lungs were clear and it was a virus. The next day, his fever shot up to 105 and he was diagnosed with walking pneumonia that night. So, while I know dr's are not perfect, I am doubting this practice a little bit.

[E&O]

From what I've read about your DC, it really does sound like its typical winter weather sickness. (Especially if she is in daycare). My DS just turned 10 months and had pretty much what you described. A wicked cough that come and goes every few weeks. Waking up multiple times a night just coughing and screaming. My ped explained that the stuffiness/snot runs down their throats and that causes the cough. My DS would also cough so hard that he would vomit one or twice a day. The ped told me that its actually a good thing, that's how they break up the congestion, it's productive cough. He also had a big decrease in appetite and his weight gain really slowed down (not so good when youare riding along the 3rd percentile)

A few things that helped.... running a humdifier in his room at night, keeps things moist. You can also incline one side of his mattress to keep the snot from running down his throat, and I also put Vicks on this feet at night.

But for more presistant coughing/wheezing our ped give us a nebulizer. The mist really helps to calm down the cough and he breaths much better. You mentioned having an upcoming check-up so you might want to ask about that.

But I don't think the docs are being dismissive of her problems, its just that at such a young age there is not a lot of intervention you can take. Hopefully as spring is just around the coner things will really slow down. Good luck!

[December27JJB]

Poor thing! PLEASE follow your mommy intuition, if you dont think the Dr is right, take her to another doctor for a 2nd opinion. Doctors do make mistakes. After all, you are her mommy, you know her more than the Dr does.

I will be thinking of you and your baby. Please let us know what you decide to do. I hope she feels better soon.

[kdotp]

From what I've read about your DC, it really does sound like its typical winter weather sickness. (Especially if she is in daycare). My DS just turned 10 months and had pretty much what you described. A wicked cough that come and goes every few weeks. Waking up multiple times a night just coughing and screaming. My ped explained that the stuffiness/snot runs down their throats and that causes the cough. My DS would also cough so hard that he would vomit one or twice a day. The ped told me that its actually a good thing, that's how they break up the congestion, it's productive cough. He also had a big decrease in appetite and his weight gain really slowed down (not so good when youare riding along the 3rd percentile)

A few things that helped.... running a humdifier in his room at night, keeps things moist. You can also incline one side of his mattress to keep the snot from running down his throat, and I also put Vicks on this feet at night.

But for more presistant coughing/wheezing our ped give us a nebulizer. The mist really helps to calm down the cough and he breaths much better. You mentioned having an upcoming check-up so you might want to ask about that.

But I don't think the docs are being dismissive of her problems, its just that at such a young age there is not a lot of intervention you can take. Hopefully as spring is just around the coner things will really slow down. Good luck!
This has been our experience with DD (5 months old) as well. She's had a constant cough/runny nose since starting daycare (at 2 months old) in December. We've taken her to our ped for a few visits outside of the WBV and he's said the same thing re: drainage and cough. We're in the same city as you (strawberry4) and our ped/family Dr is also in the same building as an urgent care. Personally, I don't like to go to the urgent care if we can't get in to see our Dr. Not that I don't think they can do a good job of diagnosing, just that we have a relationship with our Dr and he knows us, our kids and their history much better than an urgent care Dr.

In January RSV ran through the infant room and DD caught that. We were prescribed a nebulizer, but found that really wound her up and made for rough nights of (no) sleep.

By all means, bring it up again at her 9m WBV or get a second opinion, but like E&O said, there's not much that can be done at this age.

[strawberry4]

Thanks for your responses. She is in daycare and my husband reminded me last night that our son was the same way...he was just a little older when this all happened. But this seems different this time. I mean, he was sick but she seems sickly and weak. He would eat but she won't touch a thing. I know every baby is different. DD was a preemie and born almost 3 month early....so I am a little hypersensitive about her health. She really had no complications so I should not worry so much. I trust her pediatrician and will see what he says on Friday.

Kdotp: We don't go to an urgent care but just weekend and night hours at the pediatrician office. The one with the big fish tank! I hate seeing the other docs because it seems they are dismissive and treat all the kids as they have the same disease. She did get the RSV vaccine because she was a preemie, so I don't think it was that. Sorry your little one has been sick too. Spring could not get here soon enough.

[kdotp]

Gotcha. I totally understand about seeing other Drs, though. I want to see MY Dr, YK? Not some random who doesn't know my kid from a hole in the wall.

Boy's state basketball tournament is almost done; spring will be here soon! :) (myshel knows what I'm talking about - it seems like there's always one last winter weather event until after all the state tourneys are over.)

[IrishEyes]

My 9 month old has had a norwalk-like virus (stomach bug), then strep & bronchitis, then ear infection + pink eye. All from January thru February. I am sick of winter and all the germs at daycare. A few of the babies in the room had RSV. Now he has a cough with phlegmy stuff. I do think this is typical, however. It sucks.

[Ohana]

DD1 sounds so much like your LO. She was sick non-stop for what seemed like forever. She was also on the small side and her weight gain wasn't so great while she was sick.
We were at the ped's frequently as well, and they gave pretty much the advice given by PP.

The one thing they did strongly recommend we do, though, was to take DD out of the daycare center. Both peds we saw said that children in daycare, particularly those in large centers, are sick much more often. We use a large center and the peds told us to move to a small home daycare. In the end, we did not move DD because we felt the quality of care she received would not be as high anywhere else. She continued to be sickly until she was 2, but is now healthy and aside from the usual colds and stuffy nose issues, is generally very healthy.

[Pine Tree]

As an aside: My DD was in the ER for dehydration and they did a chest x-ray - it was clear. We went to the ped two days later and she had pneumonia. Apparently pneumonia shows up on an X-ray AFTER you can hear the crackling in the lungs through a stethoscope. The ped said he doesn't do chest x-rays for pneumonia anymore for that very reason.

[kdotp]

The one thing they did strongly recommend we do, though, was to take DD out of the daycare center. Both peds we saw said that children in daycare, particularly those in large centers, are sick much more often. We use a large center and the peds told us to move to a small home daycare. In the end, we did not move DD because we felt the quality of care she received would not be as high anywhere else. She continued to be sickly until she was 2, but is now healthy and aside from the usual colds and stuffy nose issues, is generally very healthy.

I definitely noticed a difference between my DD (who is in the infant room at a the same large facility my DS also goes to) and when my DS (now 3) was an infant at a smaller in-home daycare. DS didn't get sick nearly as much as DD is now. BUT I also agree with Ohana that we definitely feel the care given at the center is much better than the care DS received at the in-home (there were other issues that prompted us moving him out of the in-home when he was 18m, but that's another story). So we'll stick with the center even though it's $$$ and germy. I just keep telling myself she's building up immunities and by the time she gets to elementary school, she'll rarely be sick! :p

[E&O]

I just keep telling myself she's building up immunities and by the time she gets to elementary school, she'll rarely be sick!

I even saw great improvement with DD who is 2.5 this year. Aside from a stray cough and runny nose she had a great winter! She suffered through 6 EI's her first year and had tubes put in at 10 months old. So I am impressed at the change you start seeing in even the first two years. That's what I kept telling myself this winter when I was picking up DS every other week with a new illness!

[strawberry4]

Just wanted to give an update. I took DD for her 9 mo well check this morning. She was wheezing from her lungs and her ped heard it right away. He decided to put her on a steroid and breathing treatments for 5 days. He said if that does not knock it out of her system, we will go from there. He said that there could be something underlying but he hopes the steroid takes care of it. He was concerned about the length of her cough and that she has lost a little weight. So, hopefully this plan of action works. Thanks everyone for sharing your stories. I am hopeful our current plan of action works.