Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Aven's Exciting Trip to the Pediatric Gastroenterologist

Over a month ago I wrote about Aven's digestive issue of having blood in her stool. The pediatrician recommended that I go dairy free as most babies with this issue have a milk protein allergy. So, not only did I stop eating dairy, I stopped eating anything with any milk protein in it. Within a few days her eczema cleared up and her problem was significantly better. Since it didn't go away completely after a week the Dr. put her on a hypoallergenic formula called Nutramigen. In his experience kids with milk protein allergies usually clear right up on this formula. Aven was not so lucky. She actually got a lot worse, so I went back to breast milk after only 5 days of formula.

At this point blood and stool tests were ordered. Ever try to get a stool sample from a baby? Hope you never need to. Blood tests showed a slight inflammation and stool tests showed some white blood cells. Both indications of an allergy. She also got sent to Primary Children's for a scan of her intestinal tract. The Dr. wants to rule out Meckel's Direticulum. That test was negative, luckily. Next I tried a gluten free diet. This made no difference. Meanwhile, our pediatrician was trying to get us an appointment with a gastroenterologist at Primary Children's. I finally got an appointment today because there had been a cancellation.

Our appointment started with a really great nurse practitioner who spent almost 30 minutes with us (my mom accompanied me to the appointment, which turned out to be extremely helpful when it came to family history). She got a full history and asked lots of questions. She came up with a probable diagnosis an then brought the doctor in. He agreed with her diagnosis, Allergic Colitis, and said the best thing, in his opinion, was 2 weeks on an elemental formula where everything in it is broken down into it's chemical element, so it's supposed to be completely hypoallergenic. The hope is that it will give her little system a chance to heal and settle down at which point she can go back to breast milk. I was also instructed to go soy free and corn free for the time being. I guess when a baby develops this kind of allergy it opens the door for her to be allergic to all kinds of things. If the system isn't given a chance to heal before reintroducing potential allergens her chances of having severe allergic tendencies at an older age is much greater. Here's to Aven's little gut healing up speedily.

At 30 bucks a can, lets hope we only need this stuff for 2 weeks.

Here's a recent picture of our almost 14 pound Buddha baby lounging in the rocker. At least the Allergic Colitis isn't affecting her growth.

3 comments:

  1. Ughh, soy, corn and dairy free? That will not be fun (or easy!). But it's definitely better than Aven having lots of allergies. Good luck!

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  2. So are you just pumping for the next two weeks? That does not sound like fun. Good Luck, I really hope it works!

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  3. I am pumping- not fun, but worth it.

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