Up the Azith or continue with the Children's Advil ?

[acdrobert]

I recently recieved an email from Dr. K in which he stated that he did want us to continue to give Thomas a daily dose of Children's Advil (200 mg once per day) He said that repetative use of Advil was associated with liver malfunction. He said that he would rather go up the Azith (currently at 250 mg) than have me give him the Advil. Thomas' motor tics have remained in check even during a bout with a mild virus with this dose of Advil. Vocal tics are still faint humming.

 

Any thoughts on this ? I don't want to go up on the Azith. We have managed to keep his system in check with the probiotics and I don't want to upset that balance. Also Azith won't affect the virus, althought I think it does have some anti-inflammatory properties (I read that somewhere) There are some very well documented affects of long term anitbiotic use.

 

Any thoughts or advice ?

[NancyD]

Hi acdrobert,

 

I can't advise you what to do here, but I can tell you that my daughter has been on 400 mg motrin 3x daily for the past month and what a difference it has made for the OCD! I can tell when she misses her mid-day dose. I am aware of the side effects and we do check her liver monthly when we do her IVIG infusions. I would much rather give her motrin than all those psychiatric meds we tried over the years.

 

Nancy

 

I recently recieved an email from Dr. K in which he stated that he did want us to continue to give Thomas a daily dose of Children's Advil (200 mg once per day) He said that repetative use of Advil was associated with liver malfunction. He said that he would rather go up the Azith (currently at 250 mg) than have me give him the Advil. Thomas' motor tics have remained in check even during a bout with a mild virus with this dose of Advil. Vocal tics are still faint humming.

 

Any thoughts on this ? I don't want to go up on the Azith. We have managed to keep his system in check with the probiotics and I don't want to upset that balance. Also Azith won't affect the virus, althought I think it does have some anti-inflammatory properties (I read that somewhere) There are some very well documented affects of long term anitbiotic use.

 

Any thoughts or advice ?

[thereishope]

Let me begin by saying my son is not on Azith so I cannot give a a first hand opinion on this. However, like you said, long term antibiotics can also have negative side effects, specifically liver problems.Personally, I would probably stick with what is working right now. I would continue with the Ibruprofen. Unfortunately this is when it comes down to the fact that YOU live this, not him so it's a little easier for a doctor to say change this/change that w/o truly knowing what the outcome may be.

 

Now keep in mind, over time, if you continue to give a daily dose of Advil, the effects may diminish from the dose you are currently giving. After awhile, you may have to up the dose of Advil in order to maintain where you are. It is like that when you take Advil or Tylenol for headaches. If you take it every time you hurt, it will stop working over time. Or you find you need to take higher doses or take it more often.

[sf_mom]

I'm curious how you know long term antibiotics can effect the liver? I've been told there is no problem other than potential skin and vaginal yeast infections with long term use just not an accepted practice by the medical community. I also understand it was fairly common practice 30 years ago.

[thereishope]

One the doctors told me that.

[sf_mom]

Thanks, tried to research on-line a little and didn't come up with anything.

 

My Father-In-Law is a Urologist and he is the one that told me there is no problem with long term use of antibiotics. As a matter of fact, they used to give it prophylactically to women who suffered from chronic bladder infections and for many other reasons. I had him read PANDAS Network and was very impressed with information and concurred with the recommendations we've been given to treat very aggressively with IVIG.

 

Anyway, always concerned about the long term implications as our current plan is to keep him on antibiotics until he hits puberty and shows signs of his own immunity protection.

 

-Wendy

[EAMom]

My dd (currently 55 pounds) has been on 250mg Azith daily since June 08. The Stanford Univ. (LPCH) immunologist we saw felt this would be a safe dose for her to stay on for years. I asked why peds and so many other docs were against prophylatic antibiotics/long term antiibotics and he felt their fears were unfounded and that peds (etc.), that they had been taught to be unnecessarily fearful of using antibiotics. We did check her liver values at that point (she had been on the Azith for 9mo.) and everything was fine.

 

The immunologist also had (this was spring 09) us add back on the Advil (we had been giving Summer 08, but had stopped b/c our dd was through the worst of her PANDAS and we were concerned about long term use). He felt 200mg daily was a safe long term dose (for her weight). (The implication being, we could go higher in the short term if needed.)

 

Personally, I would be more concerned about liver problems from tylenol, not advil.

 

Vickie, I have heard about Advil (etc.) becoming less effective for headaches with chronic use...but it is unclear to me if that also applies to PANDAS and other uses (eg arthritis).

 

SFMOM--I once also tried to search about prophylactic abs being "dangerous" like so many docs seem to warn, and couldn't find any actual research to back that up. I get the feeling that is one of those urban myths that everyone just believes....like how we were always told we need to drink 8 glasses of water /day and then a year or so ago it came out that the 8 glasses a day business was bunk.

[acdrobert]

Thank you all so much for your insights. I now feel much better !

 

 

 

I recently recieved an email from Dr. K in which he stated that he did want us to continue to give Thomas a daily dose of Children's Advil (200 mg once per day) He said that repetative use of Advil was associated with liver malfunction. He said that he would rather go up the Azith (currently at 250 mg) than have me give him the Advil. Thomas' motor tics have remained in check even during a bout with a mild virus with this dose of Advil. Vocal tics are still faint humming.

 

Any thoughts on this ? I don't want to go up on the Azith. We have managed to keep his system in check with the probiotics and I don't want to upset that balance. Also Azith won't affect the virus, althought I think it does have some anti-inflammatory properties (I read that somewhere) There are some very well documented affects of long term anitbiotic use.

 

Any thoughts or advice ?

[thereishope]

I think for arthritis, Aleve actually works better than Ibruprofen. However, I know some parents say that Aleve isn't as effective for PANDAS. Wonder why.

 

 

 

 

My dd (currently 55 pounds) has been on 250mg Azith daily since June 08. The Stanford Univ. (LPCH) immunologist we saw felt this would be a safe dose for her to stay on for years. I asked why peds and so many other docs were against prophylatic antibiotics/long term antiibotics and he felt their fears were unfounded and that peds (etc.), that they had been taught to be unnecessarily fearful of using antibiotics. We did check her liver values at that point (she had been on the Azith for 9mo.) and everything was fine.

 

The immunologist also had (this was spring 09) us add back on the Advil (we had been giving Summer 08, but had stopped b/c our dd was through the worst of her PANDAS and we were concerned about long term use). He felt 200mg daily was a safe long term dose (for her weight). (The implication being, we could go higher in the short term if needed.)

 

Personally, I would be more concerned about liver problems from tylenol, not advil.

 

Vickie, I have heard about Advil (etc.) becoming less effective for headaches with chronic use...but it is unclear to me if that also applies to PANDAS and other uses (eg arthritis).

 

SFMOM--I once also tried to search about prophylactic abs being "dangerous" like so many docs seem to warn, and couldn't find any actual research to back that up. I get the feeling that is one of those urban myths that everyone just believes....like how we were always told we need to drink 8 glasses of water /day and then a year or so ago it came out that the 8 glasses a day business was bunk.

[EAMom]

yup, we tried Aleve at one point, it didn't work for pandas.

[Iowamom]

My dd (currently 55 pounds) has been on 250mg Azith daily since June 08. The Stanford Univ. (LPCH) immunologist we saw felt this would be a safe dose for her to stay on for years. I asked why peds and so many other docs were against prophylatic antibiotics/long term antiibotics and he felt their fears were unfounded and that peds (etc.), that they had been taught to be unnecessarily fearful of using antibiotics. We did check her liver values at that point (she had been on the Azith for 9mo.) and everything was fine.

 

The immunologist also had (this was spring 09) us add back on the Advil (we had been giving Summer 08, but had stopped b/c our dd was through the worst of her PANDAS and we were concerned about long term use). He felt 200mg daily was a safe long term dose (for her weight). (The implication being, we could go higher in the short term if needed.)

 

Personally, I would be more concerned about liver problems from tylenol, not advil.

 

Vickie, I have heard about Advil (etc.) becoming less effective for headaches with chronic use...but it is unclear to me if that also applies to PANDAS and other uses (eg arthritis).

 

SFMOM--I once also tried to search about prophylactic abs being "dangerous" like so many docs seem to warn, and couldn't find any actual research to back that up. I get the feeling that is one of those urban myths that everyone just believes....like how we were always told we need to drink 8 glasses of water /day and then a year or so ago it came out that the 8 glasses a day business was bunk.

 

 

I'll throw in my two cents on the long term prophylactic abx. I can't remember where I read this, but it makes sense. If you have eradicated the strep (and other bacteria) and then are put on the pabx and stay on them, there are no leftover bacteria that can start building up a resistance to the abx. I had to think on that a bit, but it does make sense. The bigger problem, IMO, is people not finishing a course of antibiotics, or skipping doses. Leftover bugs. Not a good deal. There aren't any leftover bugs if you're on pabx. I don't know if this would pass microbiology muster, but it's worth a thought.

 

Dawn