Suggestions please

[Rochelle Marsden]

I am posting this on behalf of somene who is waiting her approval to join the list. She is a classical homeopath which expolains why she has already prescribed.

Regards
Rochelle

My 3 week old twin daughter was born with breathing problems which initially caused them to tube her and air-evac her to the NICU at the children's hospital. They have since done a whole lot of tests, but have come up empty as to why this is happening. Apparently her lungs are anatomically perfect and nothing much else could be found. Part of the reason for that is that she is/was under anasthetic while these tests happen and when she's relaxed there is no problem, so really the only thing that can be checked is anatomy but nothing much else.

Her symptoms are the following: When she gets upset, ie she starts crying, she will go into a strider episode. The strider noise is only audible on inspiration, she gasps for air, her little chest "caves" in and it sounds like she is breathing around an obstruction. Her face will go bright red and she'll start to perspire on her face and head from the effort of breathing. She responds to being comforted, held tight, put on her stomach etc. In addition what needs to happen in order to keep her from turning blue is blow by oxygen (and oxygen mask by the side of her face rather than on her face).
I have also noticed the following when her strider episodes start. It will be hard to explain but here it goes anyway. While holding her it feels on her back (and it also sounds like) a "lid" or valve is "going the wrong way". If I were to make an educated guess I would say that either somewhere in her voicebox or the lid to the epiglottis is not hardened enough or the muscles are too floppy which causes them to "collapse" into her airways when she gets upset, ie when her breathing becomes more rapid. However, this is just my feeling and has not been confirmed in any way so far.

In addition to all the above we do have a couple of new symptoms since yesterday, which have made everything somewhat worse. She appears to have reflux, which means that her food comes back up about 1/2 and hour to an hour after she ate. It comes up in a projectile fashion ... being forced quite far and through her nose to boot. Having her on an incline for feeding and for sleeping has not prevented this. Unfortunately she is predominantly on formula, only getting the odd appetizer of breastmilk (my milk never quite came in). When this throwing up happens she of course gets very upset ... and goes into pretty intense striders. The whole thing is made worse by mucus that is clear and frothy and so "sticky" that you can pull it for several inches from her mouth. Of course this makes breathing even more difficult and it appears like she is trying to breath through "bubble gum". Due to this her heartrate goes quite high (above 210), which causes the monitor to go off, which is a LOUD noise, which upset her more etc.

Generally she responds very well to touch ... any kind of touch, be it being held, stroking any part of her, massaging her feet etc will calm her down. When she is awake she does have noisy breathing, again only on inspiration ... like various degrees of "squeeking". When she is quite relaxed though or deeply asleep there is no noise to be heard. Other than that she is a very alert and happy baby.
She is not the most patient baby - again probably due to her inability to relax. She also visibly relaxes when she is put together with her twin brother. She appears to be somewhat more bothered by noises these days.
She was born somewhat premature (35 wks) via emergency c-section. I was severely pre-eclamptic and that also means that unfortunately my babies were exposed to a LOT of medication.
She spent 2 weeks in the NICU in the hope she would "snap out" of the striders or we would find a definite diagnosis but none of that has happened. Once I got her home I did administer Arn 200 as the little girl seemed in shock more than anything else and was quite weary of being touched. As mentioned above ... this is no longer the case.
She also responded well to Puls along the line, but not drastically so -part from anything else, she does NOT have thirstlessness going on ... she will eat/drink quite a bit .... in big gulps if allowed. I have since put her on a feeding system that slows the milk down some and makes her work harder for it in an effort to not overload her stomach. For now it has worked ... but it has only been two feeds since, so can't be sure yet.
Another thing is that even though she is somewhat impatient and does get upset easily, she does not appear to be angry (so I ruled out Cham and am weary of Bell) ... she is probably more "uptight" and anxious rather than angry.
Other than that she appears to be thriving, having her gained back her birth weight and an additional 1 lb and 11 oz. She also poops and pees as she should.
Oh one maybe more interesting thing is that she likes to work her feet out of the swaddle ... they are always a priority. They don't however appear to be unusually hot or cold, she just seems to like them out of the swaddle, but not out of the blanket.

Sorry this turned out to be so long ... I wanted to be as accurate as possible. Any help would be very much appreciated. I am a homeopath myself and am looking for an exchange of ideas rather than somebody else prescribing for her ... rubric ideas, input I haven't thought of yet, questions I haven't asked yet etc., so I can compare and expand on my own repertorization.

TIA.

Birgit
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[Joy Lucas]

Briefly, I was wondering if it was the mucous that is actually causing
the problem, it accumulates to an extraordinary degree and cannot be
expelled due to its stickiness - this sounds like a couple of rx such
as Kali bich and even more so like Coccus cacti and I would certainly
want to study the rubrics that pertain to tenacious mucous etc. Hope
useful.

Also you say she is waiting for approval to join this list - this never
used to happen and you could join almost instantly and I know a few
others who have been waiting weeks to join, don't know what's going on
there.

Best, Joy
http://www.homeopathicmateriamedica.com
http://www.homeopathicmateriamedica.blogspot.com
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[Rochelle Marsden]

In reply to Joy's post:

I have looked into rubrics/remedies with tenacious mucus, however just to
clarify, this appears to be "stomach mucus" rather than "lung mucus" as it
only appears when there has been projectile vomiting of food. Her lungs,
other than the strider sound, are clear. No rattling, no mucus, no actual
wheezing ... just a sort of squeeking sound (during normal breathing ... not
during an actual strider episode).

Thank you for your suggestions!

Birgit

[Joy Lucas]

I didn't mention the lungs which is why I suggested Kali bich and/or
Cocc cacti and it would be wrong to 'closet' Cocc cacti as a lung rx
just because it is a dominant rx for whooping cough - it is any organ
that produces mucous that is covered by these rx and the stomach is
important in both these rx. More specifically Coccus has an
accumulation of viscid mucous in the throat which excites vomiting. You
suggested a valve wasn't operating properly - that only leaves the
pylorus and the wind pipe and Coccus has a constricted throat as though
a plug in it so the mucous could be accumulating anywhere and the force
of projectile vomiting can bring the mucous up from anywhere, so how
can you be sure where the mucous is from. You did say it seemed as
though she was breathing around an obstruction and if the mucous is
higher up in the throat, not the lungs, then this would cause breathing
problems. Again, Coccus vomits the viscid mucous that is in the throat.

There are many remedies that vomit mucous - Phos, Drosera, Alumen, Ant
tart, Ipecac, Veratrum, but not many have the type of mucous you
described. Kali bich, Cocc cacti, Alumen + ?

The gasping for air without a mucous rattle could be because the mucous
is too thick to rattle but I wouldn't rule out the rx that do have the
rattle. If it is a question of combining the gasping for air and the
vomiting of this specific type of mucous then this does narrow it down.

Another rx that has the gasping for air and the vomiting of jelly like
mucous is Laurocerasus.

Perhaps check the Breathing obstructed rubrics. Can't find anything on
squeeking but there is 'shrill' breathing and also 'whistling' if that
helps.

I am sure others could help more. Best, Joy

http://www.homeopathicmateriamedica.com
http://www.homeopathicmateriamedica.blogspot.com
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[muthu kumar]

Glottis spasm - (knerr)
without any cough in children - Cup.m
< crying or getting angry - Sulph
----
Infants - asphyxia Acon, Ant.t, Arn, Bell, Camph, Lauroc, Op
Infants anxiety - Acon, Cham

May be Acon followed by Sulph could work, Ant.tart , Cup.m, Lauroc
also look good. Sulph looks good - it has easy startling, spasms of
glottis, how about the putting leg out?
Another remedy I came across was Sambucus.

Please read the remedies in MMPura and Hering for selection so that
you will get both pathogenetic and cured symptoms.
--- In minutus@yahoogroups.com, "Rochelle Marsden"
wrote:
to join the list. She is a classical homeopath which expolains why
she has already prescribed.
which initially caused them to tube her and air-evac her to the NICU
at the children's hospital. They have since done a whole lot of
tests, but have come up empty as to why this is happening.
Apparently her lungs are anatomically perfect and nothing much else
could be found. Part of the reason for that is that she is/was under
anasthetic while these tests happen and when she's relaxed there is
no problem, so really the only thing that can be checked is anatomy
but nothing much else.
starts crying, she will go into a strider episode. The strider noise
is only audible on inspiration, she gasps for air, her little
chest "caves" in and it sounds like she is breathing around an
obstruction. Her face will go bright red and she'll start to
perspire on her face and head from the effort of breathing. She
responds to being comforted, held tight, put on her stomach etc. In
addition what needs to happen in order to keep her from turning blue
is blow by oxygen (and oxygen mask by the side of her face rather
than on her face).
start. It will be hard to explain but here it goes anyway. While
holding her it feels on her back (and it also sounds like) a "lid"
or valve is "going the wrong way". If I were to make an educated
guess I would say that either somewhere in her voicebox or the lid
to the epiglottis is not hardened enough or the muscles are too
floppy which causes them to "collapse" into her airways when she
gets upset, ie when her breathing becomes more rapid. However, this
is just my feeling and has not been confirmed in any way so far.
symptoms since yesterday, which have made everything somewhat worse.
She appears to have reflux, which means that her food comes back up
about 1/2 and hour to an hour after she ate. It comes up in a
projectile fashion ... being forced quite far and through her nose
to boot. Having her on an incline for feeding and for sleeping has
not prevented this. Unfortunately she is predominantly on formula,
only getting the odd appetizer of breastmilk (my milk never quite
came in). When this throwing up happens she of course gets very
upset ... and goes into pretty intense striders. The whole thing is
made worse by mucus that is clear and frothy and so "sticky" that
you can pull it for several inches from her mouth. Of course this
makes breathing even more difficult and it appears like she is
trying to breath through "bubble gum". Due to this her heartrate
goes quite high (above 210), which causes the monitor to go off,
which is a LOUD noise, which upset her more etc.
touch, be it being held, stroking any part of her, massaging her
feet etc will calm her down. When she is awake she does have noisy
breathing, again only on inspiration ... like various degrees
of "squeeking". When she is quite relaxed though or deeply asleep
there is no noise to be heard. Other than that she is a very alert
and happy baby.
inability to relax. She also visibly relaxes when she is put
together with her twin brother. She appears to be somewhat more
bothered by noises these days.
section. I was severely pre-eclamptic and that also means that
unfortunately my babies were exposed to a LOT of medication.
out" of the striders or we would find a definite diagnosis but none
of that has happened. Once I got her home I did administer Arn 200
as the little girl seemed in shock more than anything else and was
quite weary of being touched. As mentioned above ... this is no
longer the case.
drastically so -part from anything else, she does NOT have
thirstlessness going on ... she will eat/drink quite a bit .... in
big gulps if allowed. I have since put her on a feeding system that
slows the milk down some and makes her work harder for it in an
effort to not overload her stomach. For now it has worked ... but it
has only been two feeds since, so can't be sure yet.
and does get upset easily, she does not appear to be angry (so I
ruled out Cham and am weary of Bell) ... she is probably
more "uptight" and anxious rather than angry.
gained back her birth weight and an additional 1 lb and 11 oz. She
also poops and pees as she should.
work her feet out of the swaddle ... they are always a priority.
They don't however appear to be unusually hot or cold, she just
seems to like them out of the swaddle, but not out of the blanket.
accurate as possible. Any help would be very much appreciated. I am
a homeopath myself and am looking for an exchange of ideas rather
than somebody else prescribing for her ... rubric ideas, input I
haven't thought of yet, questions I haven't asked yet etc., so I can
compare and expand on my own repertorization.

[Robyn]

To add to H2002's post

Aconite may be an easy test for tracheo/laryngteal spasms not due to infection. Stridor is a
whistling sound made usually on inspiration due to a blockage in the trachea or larynx, so look for
laryngeal asthma, spasms and glottis references.

Sambucus does also look promising in this regard -- as it specifically is noted for new borns.

Here is an interesting experpt from EH:

Hempel, C.J., A New and Comprehensive System of Materia Medica Vol. 1. Lecture X11 -- Aconitum
napellus

"Among the symptoms of Aconite there is one which deserves particular mention; it is this:
"Paralytic weakness of the epiglottis, causing the ready passage of food and drink into the larynx
during deglutition, which induces a suffocative sensation, with cough."
[hpc2 - Aconitum napellus] This weakness may occur as an actual morbid condition, and is generally
represented pathologically by congestion and consequent tumefaction of the epiglottis. A change of
this kind may likewise constitute a prominent feature in
[hpc2 - Aconitum napellus] Laryngismus stridulus or Asthma Millari, in which affection Aconite is
eminently specific; the affection is characterised by violent paroxysms of suffocative breathing
which often rouse the child from its slumber with a shrill cry; the pulse becomes small and hurried,
the face looks congested, purplish, the lips are blue, swollen, the eyes express agonizing distress.
Give Aconite, first potency. "

(I would aim for the lowest potency could find --- which may be different in different countries --
I have a 4x I think - but I would suggest that the lower potencies are more likely to have the
sphere of action for this kind of thing than the higher potencies )
Giving Aconite in this way, when the attacks occur, may not 'cure' the problem, but may stop the
spasm --- and maybe it is the immaturity of the babies 'apparatus' which will mature in a short
time. The distress from the spasms would be my first concern --- immaturity of the esophageal
sphincter may also fit this picture, and may resolve with maturity as well.
----------------

From Radar 9.1 Various Repertories -- some ideas you have probably already seen though -- there are
many remedies covered in these rubrics

Millar's asthma (see Larynx-Laryngismus)
LARYNX AND TRACHEA - LARYNGISMUS stridulus
LARYNX AND TRACHEA - CONSTRICTION - Larynx
LARYNX & TRACHEA - PHENOMENA - LARYNGISMUS stridulus
RESPIRATION - PHENOMENA - STRIDULOUS
LARYNX & TRACHEA - PHENOMENA - LARYNGISMUS stridulus - newborns, in - Samb (reference from Pierre
Schmidt)
LARYNX & TRACHEA - PHENOMENA - LARYNGISMUS stridulus - sudden
LARYNX & TRACHEA - PHENOMENA - LEAF closing up trachea, like a
RESPIRATION - PHENOMENA - STRIDULOUS - inspiration
LARYNX AND TRACHEA - LARYNGISMUS stridulus
LARYNX AND TRACHEA - LARYNGISMUS stridulus - hysterical
RESPIRATION - STRIDULOUS
Boger/Boenninghausen
LARYNX AND TRACHEA - Spasm of, cramp (asthma Millari)

Acon. ant-c. ars. asaf. BELL. Brom. Calc. Calc-p. cham. chlor. crot-h. Cupr. dig. ferr. gels. hep.
Hyos. Ign. iod. Ip. lach. Laur. Mag-p. meny. Meph. MOSCH. op. phos. phyt. plat. plb. SAMB. sil.
Spong. stram. sulph. ter. Verat. visc.2

Just some ideas

Best
Robyn
"The fact is we need any and every way of finding the right remedy; the simple simile, the simple
symptomatic similimum and the farthest reach of all - the pathologic similimum, and I maintain that
we are still well within the lines of Homoeopathy that is expansive, progressive, science fostered
and science fostering." (Dr. J. Compton Burnett)