Symptoms of acid reflex in a baby?

Question

my son was diagnosed with milk allergies and recently discovered he has acid reflex... im leaning to beleive he just has acid reflex, not milk allergies... what are the symptoms of acid reflex?

Answer 1

It could very well be both. I had milk allergies as a baby, but they went away as I got older. I was fed soy milk until I was four or five, but I'm fine with dairy products now.

Acid reflux is fairly common in babies, since their stomachs are not quite used to digesting things yet. Generally the main symptom is regurgitation--which we all know babies do quite a lot. It can also make them fussy, of course. But this should go away as your baby gets older.

If he's been diagnosed with milk allergies, I would take the diagnosis to heart. You don't want to take the chance on making your baby sick!

Answer 2

My daughter had wheezing and spitting up. At first they thought it was asthma and gave me a nebulizer and all the works, then the other ped. I saw said acid reflux and the zantac helped a lot. I didn't realize that wheezing could be a symptom. It burned her throat when it came up and made her wheeze. It sounded awful, I was so happy when we figured it all out and she stopped doing that because it was scarey.

Answer 3

Oh darling, does your question take me back...  

My son was born a beautiful, healthy, huge baby boy.  He weighted 9lbs 9oz at birth and yet was still so long he almost seemed skinny.  He could hold his head up in the delivery room!  I thought everything would go SO smoothly....

Then we got him home from the hospital...

For the first two days he would nurse almost none at all.  He only wanted his pacifier.  After calling the doctor we took the paci away.  Then he wanted to nurse constantly!!   He would gorge himself, come away, vomit up half his stomach, and gorge himself again.  

Eventually we got to the point where I simply could not produce enough milk to keep up, so we switched to formula.  We were in the same pattern, but at least with formula it was somewhat  easier.  My son was almost constantly spitting up, but after eating it was frequently more like vomitting that just spitting up.  I remember one time vividly.  It was actually after a nursing.  I had nursed him and nursed him, and finally he seemed satisfied.  I burped him, and then layed him in his carseat/carrier to doze while I went outside to fetch somethign from the car.  (We were at my parents house, he wasn't alone.)  Anyway, I came back in from the car and found him half sitting up in the bassinet projectile vomitting milk...  it seriously looked like someone was spraying a garden hose!  I couldn't believe how long it lasted!  That's when I knew we had a real problem on our hands!  Before that, I'd thought it was just normal baby spitting up.  

Unfortunately, shortly after that incident, my son came down with a severe respitory infection.  He almost died and was hospitalized.  Though the infection passed, he still had an almost constant cough and had much trouble breathing.  (Later this was diagnoses as extremely early onset Asthma).  The doctors thought at first that his spitting up and vomitting was caused by his difficulty breathing.  They thought his gasping was putting too much pressure on his stomach.  After some tests ruled that out, they suggested we stop breast feeding and switch formulas.  We went through probably 7 or 8 different formulas with no improvement.  He actually did much worse on soy formula than normal formula.  There was one (I can't remember the name - the super expensive one) that he did a little better on, but not much.  

During this time, his pediatrician had decided to close her practice.  We were left without a really good primary doctor while we searched for a new one.  His pulmonologist suggested we try and get in with a GI doctor, but of course the waiting list was months.  When we did find a new pediatrician, she suggested we try my son on Zantac in the meantime.  If it worked, we wouldn't even have to bother with the GI specialist.  I was all for it - after all, what could it hurt.  I read up, and there were no indications that Zantac wasn't perfectly safe for children his age...  by all indications it was safer than his breathing treatments, and eating is almost as important as breathing.  

The Zantac worked wonders.  Within two weeks of starting the Zantac, my son was almost spit-up free.  Sure we'd have eppisodes maybe once or twice a week - but after months of almost continual discharges it was a true blessing!  He could drink normal formula (I'd dried up by then and didn't bother to try to restart breastfeeding), and had no problems.   Even better is that after only 3 months of being on Zantac we were able to wean him off it, and the acid reflux stayed gone!  

I'm not sure what all the possible symptoms of reflux are, but I know many of them can be similar to milk allergies.  If you're not having any luck with switching formulas, ask your doctor if you can at least try Zantac and see how your baby does.  After all - what could it hurt?

Answer 4

Well, food allergies/intolerances and reflux often go hand-in-hand.  It's one of the first symptoms.  BUT it could be that his tummy just can't yet digest the dairy properly. My son had reflux, he didn't spit up often, but instead he would swallow it back down.  He hated being on his back, he was extremely fussy, and would cry after a feeding.

I'm a firm believer that if you get rid of the offending food, the reflux will go away.  I had to cut many foods out of my diet, but my son went from being on Zantac 3 times a day to no reflux in a few weeks after my diet change.  It's something to consider.  

Answer 5

my four month old son has it. it's hard for a baby that has it to digest foods or liquids regularly. my son used to spit up his formula like the demon from the "excorcist"...lol. i know it's gross, right?. but anyways your pediatrician will give you a specific eating plan for your child and possibly some meds. I switched his milk to ENFAMIL PRO-SOBEE it has pure soy in it, he likes and he can digest it well. Good luck. Stay away from foods with lots of acidity. give the baby water too. the symptoms are vomitting, lots of spit up just so you knnow.

Answer 6

The best way to address baby acid reflux is by adopting the holistic approach while focusing on a comprehensive set of all natural lifestyle and dietary changes. Recent researches provide strong support to this approach. For example, one research showed a 40% rate of recovery in babies with gastroesophageal reflux disease after switching from a cow's milk based formula to a soy-based formula. Another research showed the worsening of acid reflux symptoms when babies were given juice products. Changing feeding and sleeping position was also found beneficial in cases of baby acid reflux.

Answer 7

crying unless sitting somewhat upright. (ie, my daughter would only sleep in her car seat until we diagnosed it)

constantly spitting up milk, and constantly wanting to eat

I used to hear a "ping" ing noise when she was drinking her milk.

the best thing.. even better than the meds prescribed, was loading her formula with cereal.. to make it heavy enough to stay down... if you need help with other questions or more info, feel free to email