Tell me everything you know about ear tubes :)

[whitestavern]

My brother's pediatrician is recommending ear tubes for my nephew. He's 18 months old and has had many many ear infections (he's in daycare; both parents work). I'm hoping I can some BTDT advice to pass along to him: questions for the ped, things to watch out for, good and/or bad results from ear tubes, etc. etc. Thanks so much in advance!

[Runningmom80]

My younger ds got them at 19 months. I was apprehensive, I tend to be a non-invasive, natural remedy kind of mom. But, my ds was miserable, and he wasn't talking at all. The difference before and after is amazing. Everyone noticed his personality change. He was a happy boy for once. The ENT told us he had 100% blockage in one ear, and probably had little hearing in the other. Within a month he had 20 words. From 1. He only said "dada" before the tubes.

 

He's only had one infection since getting them, and he's had them a year. The good part is I can use drops for an infection now, instead of getting him a rx for antibiotics.

[amo_mea_filiis.]

I have nothing negative to say about tubes. I just had my third set as an adult put in this past Tuesday.

 

I had an ent say (when ds was younger) that he likes to do tubes, tonsils and adenoids at the same time. He said the tonsils and adenoids being removed decreases the need for more tubes as a child.

 

My son had tubes put in at 18 months, then we met the above ent who removed his tonsils and adenoids when he removed a "stuck" tube (tube had fallen out, but was attached to the ear drum).

 

Ds now has no ear problems, and his hearing is amazing.

 

My understanding is the complications are minimal. You do have to be careful about water getting in the ears, and sometimes they fall out too soon, or not soon enough.

 

For me, the quality of my hearing is (normally) extremely better. This round of tubes has not yet kicked in with the hearing, but i think its from the lack of post op drops.

 

I would not hesitate doing tubes in a child.

[KrissiK]

I had two children who've had them. My son had then at 15 months due to multiple ear infections. Great, no problem, he literally hasn't been on antibiotics since. My daughter got them when she was 5. She had some ear infections, but also problems with fluid build up in her ears that was affecting her hearing. The procedure went fine, the tubes fell out after 10 months, but I don't think it really solved her fluid/hearing problem. Both procedure went well, recovery was a breeze with both kids and the worst part was remembering to put in the ear plugs when they went swimming.

[Mergath]

My dd got them at fourteen months, along with getting her tongue tie snipped. We didn't have any problems. They put her under, and it was done very quickly. No complications, and we used those sticky earplugs during her baths after that. Her language skills improved quite a lot after that, too.

[Murmer]

Tubes made it possible for my son to hear! He had moderate hearing loss due to fluid which made him impossible to understand. Within 2 months of the tubes I can now understand 95% of what he says and he can now understand what I say to him. It was a miracle for us. They were done right before he turned 3 and it was quick and easy same day process.

[Heather in Neverland]

Best thing we ever did! Oldest ds had them at 10 months and again at 4 yo. Before his first set he had constant ear infections and a 40% hearing loss. After tubes he started talking immediately and his hearing was perfect. Best of all... Never had another ear infection!

[Pippen]

Nothing but good experiences here (one for a 4 1/2 month old infant and the others for me as an adult). Broke the ear infection cycle for both of us. In contrast one of children always made it just short of the threshold the ped would refer for tube evaluation and we had years of dealing with it.

 

I was of course worried about my 4 1/2 month old being put under but it was quick and he was back in my arms wailing in no time.

 

I do have a friend whose child needed repeat tubes and wound up having to do an eardrum repair from where it didn't heal up after removal, but that was one incident out of the many positive experiences I know of.

[athena1277]

Tubes helped my dd tremendously. She got them at 16 months after having several ear infections. The infections and fluid in the ears were starting to affect her speech development. She said Mama, Dada, and Buh. Buh was just about anything. Ball, baby banana, bottle, etc. About a month after she got the tubes, her speech exploded and she was saying all kinds of things. She finally was hearing and saying the ending sounds of words.

 

The only problem was that the anastesia (sp?) made her mad as a hornet. They said that it often makes little kids feel weird and they don't have a way to tell you, so they scream. She literally screamed from the time she woke up until she fell asleep from exhaustion when we brought her home. Once she slept a bit she was fine.

[wapiti]

Get them.

 

Our experience with premie twins: Twin A got them at 2 y.o. (lots of ear infections), Twin B didn't (even though he had had lots of "sinus" infections rather than "ear" infections). Both had delayed speech. Both started talking around 3 y.o. Twin A, with tubes - once he started talking, his speech took off. Tubes fell out after a year or something; I can't remember. Twin B is still in speech therapy at 9 y.o. Although they are different kids with different issues (Twin B has other serious unrelated medical issues, was small-for-gestational-age, etc.), I totally regret not pushing for tubes for my Twin B. It seems there is a critical period for developing nerve pathways and language areas in the brain and it's not so easy to develop that later.

[Seasider]

Similar experiences here, child at 19 months doubled her vocabulary and stopped abx (didn't need 'em for years!) following surgery [ETA she had been on tons of meds and had become resistant to 2 different types of antibiotics prior to surgery.] . I mean, her vocabulary doubled within 4 days following surgery!

 

She did have one tube migrate as she grew and become lodged by its wee flanges astride the tiny bony ridge along the eardrum edge. She had surgery to remove it at age 3. Complete recovery.

 

You will be stunned at how short a procedure it actually is. They took her back, I went to the bathroom, then poured a cup of coffee, and had literally just taken a seat when the surgeon came out to tell us he was finished. Amazing.

 

I have not heard of anyone having disability following surgery, though I remember hearing of a few cases where a second or third set of tubes needed to be placed as the child aged and earlier sets were naturally ejected. IIRC, these were kids who also had lots of allergy issues and dealt with lots of mucous management,many years ago (before Mucinex, haha!).

[whitestavern]

Thanks for all your responses and information. I am very happy to hear such positive experiences. My nephew does speak very little and I have been wondering why; maybe this is the answer.

[amo_mea_filiis.]

My ds did not have the expected language explosion after tubes, but that should have been the first real clue to his language disorder.

 

He had a friend in daycare that had tubes done one week after ds, and his language and behavior blew right passed ds. I think the language increase is more the norm, and not my son's experience.

[Paige]

Another vote for tubes here! My DD had tubes when she was about 18mos old. Her language was fine- she was a chatterbox. She was a very happy baby and not quiet or whiny or anything. I was very nervous because I wasn't sure of the benefits for such a happy, healthy, thriving baby. Her problem was that every time we went to the Dr, she had an ear infection. They were always asymptomatic with no fevers, no pulling at the ear, and my DD did not act as if she was pain. The first ear infection was found at a well check when she turned 1. For almost 6 months, we went in every 2 weeks to see if the new round of antibiotics had cleared it up. They never did. I am not a doctor, but every doctor who saw her, including the ENT, said her ear infection looked awful. We did the tubes and she had a lot of bleeding out of the ear. It was much more than I expected and the Dr said it was most likely because of how bad her ears were.

 

After the tubes, she surprised me by turning into a much happier, more talkative, sillier, more active girl! She must have a high pain tolerance. I am so happy we agreed to let them put tubes in. I had no idea she had been suffering because she never acted sick. She did not get another ear infection after that until the tubes fell out when she was about 3 and then the infection cleared up easily.

[Ottakee]

We have done at least 10 sets here with our kids and foster kids. NEVER EVER regretted any of them........and I had to push for a few of them to be done in a timely manner.

 

Like someone else said you hardly get seated in the waiting room and they are calling you back---gotta pee fast :-) The worst part was not eating in the morning but we never gave pain meds after tube surgery or anything. The kids were much better afterwards than before the surgery.

 

We did several repeats and I would say that if tonsils and/or adenoids are a possible issue, do that at the same time. It does make a HUGE difference.

[sbgrace]

Repeat or resistant ear infections are almost always caused by biofilms that protect the bacteria in the ear fluid from antibiotics. The only true way to deal with those is to remove the fluid and the best way to do that, when the ear doesn't naturally drain well, is with tubes. It's an extremely fast surgery. It usually takes longer to put the child under than it does to put those tubes in. When needed tubes are a very good thing!

 

My son was headed for tubes at 18 months. We did all kinds of things to try to avoid them. I actually think this was because, in his case, it wasn't a long series of repeat infections but rather one infection that wouldn't respond to antibiotics. So we went from absolutely no infections to being told he needed tubes within a couple of months. I so wanted to just irradicate that infection and avoid the tubes. I guess we were successful. But at 3.5 he got an ear infection that turned into mastoiditis. He had surgery, IV antibiotics in the hospital, and then 30 days of antibiotic by mouth at home. He suffered a lot. During the mastoiditis surgery they did insert tubes. He had one or maybe two infections after tubes but both just required ear drops. I believe my son would have been better off had he had tubes at 18 months. I regret not getting them originally.

[catz]

Tubes were the best thing we ever did for my dd. She had them placed at 14 months. She had an ear infection almost every month from 4 months on. She has had ONE ear infection since then. They stayed in place for like 4 years for her which was amazing. She became a much happier kid and was singing the ABC's shortly thereafter.

 

I tend to be anti intervention too and had a bunch of anxiety about this, but seriously, BEST THING EVER. So much better than her on and off of antibiotics constantly. She was a barfer too and I'm sure that was tied into antibiotic use. Her awesome doc said her ear structure was just more prone to infections while she was small.

[three4me]

I haven't read all the responses but just wanted to put in my two cents :) We did everything, I tell you EVERYTHING, we could do avoid getting tubes for DS. When nothing else worked we ended up doing tubes and went a full 18 months without a single ear infection. Just this month he's had another, and I suspect he's getting another now. So I think it won't be long before we get tubes again. Recovery was easy and I'm so glad he got them!

[Firestarter6923]

On 1/12/2013 at 9:49 AM, Murmer said:

Tubes made it possible for my son to hear! He had moderate hearing loss due to fluid which made him impossible to understand. Within 2 months of the tubes I can now understand 95% of what he says and he can now understand what I say to him. It was a miracle for us. They were done right before he turned 3 and it was quick and easy same day process.

My 2 y.o son couldnt hear for 2 years of his life due to fluid behind his closed off eardrums they drained fluid put tubes in and i swere he can hear us so much better my curiosity wants to know if the crying goes from being loud to like a not so loud and kinda stuffy sounding but nothing is wrong with him. Very satisfied with results

New born i was up 98%of the day and night so maybe 1 hour to 2 hours of sleep yet noone caught it till he was 2