Ear infections often visit the baby. Once this disease is common among infants, cases of ear infections often afflict five of six children before they turn three years old. If your baby is seen tugging at his ears, fussing, crying often as usual, then there is a possibility that he is sick. Watch for general signs, such as fever, discharge from the ear, difficulty sleeping, and no appetite. If so, it means he is experiencing an ear infection.
Otitis media or ear infection is a painful inflammation of the middle ear. Most otitis media occurs in the eustachian tubes, the tubes that connect the ears, nose and throat. In children, the eustachian tubes are more horizontal, shorter and smaller when compared to those of adults. This makes the child's eustachian tubes more easily blocked.
This condition can be painful for the baby and what makes it more dangerous is that he has not been able to communicate it. Therefore, check his condition to the doctor if you suspect an ear infection is bothering him, as well as to relieve discomfort experienced.
Most children who experience this condition can recover without medication. But if your baby is in the range of 6-24 months and has mild symptoms, then continue to monitor his condition before giving any medication. In this case, the drug given is required by prescription from a doctor.
Overcoming Ear Infection in Infants
While watching your baby's condition, there are steps that can be prepared to handle. Even so, seeing a doctor remains a top priority, especially if after 48-72 hours the child's condition still does not improve which is marked by the appearance of a high fever and the presence of early symptoms that are getting worse.
1. Give warm olive oil
If there is no fluid flowing from the child's ear and there is no leakage in the eardrum, try giving a few drops of olive oil into the affected ear. Make sure the olive oil is not cold or hot, but rather warm or the temperature is the same as room temperature. Do this while the baby is sleeping to keep him lying on his side with ears upright for a few minutes, then spread back. This is needed to allow oil to reach the eardrum. Don't overdo this.
2. Compress the ear with a warm, damp cloth
To help reduce pain, compress the child's ear with a towel soaked in warm water for 10-15 minutes. Before use, make sure the towel has been wrung as hard as possible.
3. Inadequate drinking supplies
Give fluids as often as possible to children. Swallowing liquids can help open the eustachian tubes so that fluid that has accumulated in the channels can flow.
4. Don't give just any medicine
Avoid giving children decongestant colds, antihistamines, or aspirin drugs. This drug does not make the child's condition for the better, instead it can give dangerous side effects. Aspirin can also make a child more susceptible to a rare fatal disease, the Reye Syndrome.
5. Raise the position of the baby's head
When the baby is sleeping, lift the baby's head slightly by placing 1-2 pillows under the mattress, not directly under the head. It aims to expedite the baby's sinus circulation.
6. Take advantage of gravity
For a few moments, lay the baby in a sideways position to position the aching ear facing up. In theory, this position will reduce the pressure by pushing the fluid out of the eardrum.
7. Shake his ears
One trick used by pediatricians to relieve ear pain is to gently pinch the ear lobe with the thumb and forefinger, then pull it slightly outward several times. This allows the eustachian tubes to open and secrete fluids.
Options for Checking Your Children to the Doctor
What if it turns out that the baby's condition is too severe to be handled alone? Means that the priority step is to take him to the hospital for examination by a doctor.
The doctor can prescribe analgesic ear drops if the child's eardrum looks red and bulging. This swelling can be caused by fluid pressure.
In certain cases, doctors can prescribe antibiotics, especially in the treatment of serious infections, that is if the child's condition does not improve within the range of 48-72 hours without treatment.
In particular, antibiotics are recommended for treatment:
- Children less than two years old with mild symptoms, but occur in both ears.
- Children with severe symptoms, such as high fever, rapid heartbeat, fatigue, or sweating.
- Infants under the age of six months because they do not have a strong immune system and are very susceptible to complications of ear infections.
Giving antibiotic drugs usually requires more consideration. Doctors in general are very careful about prescribing antibiotics for several reasons, including:
- antibiotics risk making more bacteria resistant;
- antibiotics can also kill good bacteria in a child's body so that sometimes it causes inflammatory bowel disease, and;
- antibiotics are not useful against diseases caused by viruses;
Therefore, doctors urge parents to help overcome this problem by not asking for or even forcing antibiotics every time their child has an ear infection.
As an additional consideration for parents, consult a child immediately to the doctor if he has a high fever above 38 ° C or blood or pus comes out of the ear. In addition, immediately check the child back to the doctor if after being examined and diagnosed with an ear infection, the symptoms are still not improving after 3-4 days.
In addition, take precautionary measures so that the ear infection does not come back to the child by giving him breast milk for at least the first six months because breast milk provides antibodies to fight ear infections. Make sure the baby's head position is higher than his body when he is being breastfed so as not to choke, avoid the baby from exposure to cigarette smoke, and make sure the baby gets a pneumococcal vaccine.
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