kids and ear infections

My daughter has another one this year. Im home with her today. This is number 4 this year. I never had ear problems when I was a kid. But my wife had tubes in her ears several times over the years, and even about three years ago. Is this stuff heridatary? My mom has a swimming pool ans my daughter spends lots of time in it and we take all the normal precautions. They have an appt at the ent in a couple of weeks to discuss tubes and dutch. Any suggestions on how to prevent them? Or any good remedities?

 

One of my dogs gets ear infections. When cleaning ears, use a little warm almond oil or olive oil, wet cotton wool with it and twist it into like a thin finger, wriggle it down, massaging the outside bottom of the ear to loosen anything up. Cleaning regularly helps. Dont use cotton bguds as they can cause damage. I know this is a veterinary tip, not human, but should be the same. Mulan also has ear drops to loosen wax - we did try a product from the pet shop that is also sold for humans, and mulans ears became very sore with those and needed antibiotics - it had peroxide in it.
Clean her ears out when she has been swimming, try to avoid them getting wet - Mulans dont take to having water in them, and the vet says never clean with water or water and cotton wool.
Its the extra two years training that counts I think. I do not, in all honesty, believe that the above tips would harm a human - if in doubt, human test on yourself if you like.
Best of luck to the little one, its scarey when they are in hospital and out of reach of the safe harbour that is your arms isnt it. I hope it all goes well for you all - not too many gret hairs.

 

There are more than one kind of infections. swimmer's ear does not require tubes in the ears. There could be a family hereditary situation of small ear canals. I have it, my mother had it and had many outer ear infections. My daughter had it for a while too. For swimmer's ear, my Dr recommended that we put drops of rubbing alcohol in her ears if she got water in them from swimming or baths. This eliminated the problem completely. Now that she's grow quite a bit she has no issues with it but she's also careful to avoid water in her ears.
The thing to consider is what kind of infection. Inner ear infections can be caused by smaller or plugged eustachian tubes while outer ear infections can be smaller ear canals. Although, there's nothing to say that both of these couldn't be inherited in the same situation.

 

i assume that the alcohol dries out the water?

 

I had a lot of ear infections as a kid. I never had tubes in my ears and eventually the problem cleared up. For me, it was sinus related, I do get post nasal drip a lot now. My pediatrician used to prescribe antibiotics and ear drops that would help, but I'm not sure what the drops were.