Reflux

Baby Eli has reflux. It is a common condition experience by about half of young babies from 1-3 months old. Some of you like myself may not have heard about it especially if your babies never had such 'problem' before. So let me just share with you what reflux is just for general knowledge.

As defined by Baby Centre,

" Reflux is what happens when your baby's stomach contents come back up into his food pipe (gullet or oesophagus) or even into his mouth. The long name for reflux is gastro-oesophageal reflux disease.

Babies get reflux because the muscular valve at the end of the food pipe, which acts to keep food in the tummy, hasn’t developed properly yet. This means that when your baby’s tummy is full, food and acid can come back up. This can cause him to bring up small amounts of milk (possetting) or even vomit.

During the first year of your baby's life, the muscular valve gradually gets stronger and better at keeping food down, so his chance of having reflux decreases. About half of babies will get some reflux during their first three months, but it’s only a real problem for a small percentage of these. By 10 months only about five per cent of babies have reflux (CKS 2009, Rudolph et al 2001).

According to Eli's paed and from the readings I did on reflux or GER, it is not a health problem that we should worry too much. Your baby is ok as long as he/she is a happy spitter and is growing well despite the vomiting/ spitting. However, mum being mum I still worry whenever he vomits especially when it is a lot that it will come out from his nose at times too. Most of the time he is a happy spitter except when the vomit comes out from his nose. He will get angry and starts to cry. It's heart breaking to see him getting upset then or even if he is not upset...which mothers won't right..I'm also worry if he has enough food since he does vomit out some of the milk...when we went for his 2nd review indeed he has lost weight and was back to his 1mth weight...he was already about 5kg when he was 1 month plus but during his 2nd month review he was back to 4.5kg :( But I guess that was due to the heavy vomiting initially...but now that the vomiting has tone down a bit and he started to take in more milk (from 60ml to 90ml per feeding) hopefully he will be back on track soon...

Anyway, I've noticed that the reflux on him started only from week 6 ..it was quite bad initially whereby he once vomited through his mouth and nose 3 times in one particular day... when we brought him to the doctor, he was given only one type of medicine to control him from vomiting too much...his paed said health wise, he is ok...it is only the reflux that is causing the vomiting...he said it is a phase (for babies 1-3 mths) that he will go through and will get better as he grows...his paed told us that the vomiting will still come back but as long as it is not too much like more than 3 times in a day that he vomits through his nose then it is ok...a few small vomits in a day is fine according to his paed...so with that in mind I pray that his reflux will subside soon...and indeed it has subsided a little... he still vomits now and then...sometimes a few times but at least so far (keep fingers crossed) he only vomited once through his nose in any particular day... so til his symptoms subsided or disappear completely, we need to stop and burp him more often on every feed and will need to keep him in an upright position for about half an hour after each feed before laying him down in his cot...sometimes he will make a bit of noise in between his naps which sometimes I think it is because he feels uncomfortable and need to be burped...and most of the time when I do carry and put him in an upright position he does burp :) So far his record is 9 times of vomiting/ spitting in a day...but I've read on the internet some babies can vomit/spit up to 20 times a day!!

Some friends who experienced the same condition for their babies gave anti regurgitation formula to their babies but I haven't resort to that yet (though I've bought a small can of Novalac AR formula and a bottle of Dentinox the anti wind/ colic infant drop as standby)...I've changed his bottle teats to anti-wind/ anti colic types to reduce air bubbles though...

Oh well, as frustrated and tiring (lack of sleep in the nights as I worry he will vomit or worst get chocked, a lot of changing, cleaning and laundry to be done...in fact some doctors described this condition as a "laundry problem" rather than a "health problem" as the baby is not having any health problem..just an immature digestive system...) is this reflux thingy is causing me, I'll just have to put up with it for a while for now... just as long as my baby is happy and healthy ... that is all that matter to me :)

Read this article from Babycentre if you want to know more about reflux and here is another article on 14 steps to help improve a baby's reflux for your own reading pleasure and reference :)