Help Please - Son Ill And No Diagnosis Of Anything Yet

[jackied]

Hello, I wondered if this sounded anything like Celiac to you? I'm not sure it does, but somebody on a more general website suggested that I should ask here for advice here.

My son is 14, has had trouble with sporadic vomiting and diarhoea since he was a toddler - maybe once a month. It can be triggered by eating too much, too quickly, lots of sweets, stress, or apparently no trigger at all. If he gets a stomach bug he gets it worse than anyone else. Apart from that he has been generally healthy and eats a normal diet.

5 weeks ago he and his sister both had a stomach bug. She recovered in 2 days, he is still unable to keep down any solids at all for more than five minutes. At one stage he was extremely constipated, which they sorted with laxatives and an enema - but the last two days he has had diarhoea instead. He can keep down fluids, but as you can imagine he's lost a lot of weight. He's had a stomach ache throughout but sometimes it's worse than others.

He had a blood test last week with 'no sign of inflammation or celiac' and there's no blood in his stool, but he's not had any more investigations than that, and only seen a general paediatrician. She seemed to think it might still just be a reaction to the stomach bug and would probably clear up eventually on its own. She did ring the GI consultant who said to put him on Lanzoprazole as well in case it was GERD. That was last Wednesday, but it hasn't helped.

Diet wise, he has been living on fizzy drinks, smoothies, peppermint tea and chicken stock. It's not just gluteny solids that make him sick - fruit does too. About a week ago he started having a small bowls of his favourite soup which does have a little gluten and dairy in it, and that didn't make him worse.

As you can imagine we are worried sick and don't know what to do. He's missed loads of school, too.

Thanks

[zimmer]

If it were my child, I would work towards resolving the current D before doing anything else. White rice, plain baked / broiled chicken, maybe bananas, water.... and more water. THEN I would look into the celiac and other things. If he's living on chicken stock & fizzy drinks, then his diet is salt and sugar.

Good luck and I hope he feels better soon!

[mommida]

You need to start working with a pediatric gastroenterologist. The list of illnesses with these symptoms is just too long. If he really is not holding anything down, there is an amino acid formula. If his G.I. track is not functioning he could be put on a feeding tube. Call the doctor's office and be more demanding. (If the patient hasn't been ingesting gluten, testing for Celiac would be negative as you need the reaction damage from the gluten.)

[jackied]

White rice, plain baked / broiled chicken, maybe bananas

But he can't keep anything down at all...

You need to start working with a pediatric gastroenterologist.

The paediatricians said they'd refer him to gastroenterology if he hadn't improved in another ten days but I think you're right, he needs seeing again sooner than that. I talked to him (son) about it and he's agreed that I should ring our GP tomorrow if he's no better, and hopefully they can stir the hospital up a bit!

We're in the UK so the system is a bit different to what some of you may be used to. Usually good (and of course free) but sometimes slooooowwww.

Thanks