Hunter's Day at the Doctor's

Today Hunter had an appointment with his pediatrician to see what to do about his ears. For those who don't know what is going on, let me fill you in and then I'll talk about today's wonderful day at the doctors.
Ever since Hunter was little, I have thought he had trouble distinguishing sounds. But I never did anything about it. He has struggled with his talking and when he gets really excited, his words just become mumbles. Well for his kindergarten screening earlier this spring he struggled with the hearing test so he has sent to an audiologist. In July we went for Hunter's first appointment. When they took a "picture" of Hunter's ear it was not flat, it was convex or concave I can't remember which. He also struggled to hear some of the pitches, scoring right at the bottom of normal, but when they put the sounds directly on the nerve bypassing the eardrum he heard the beeps just fine. They asked if he had been sick which he hadn't and wanted to do a follow-up appointment a month later. So in August, Hunter and I went to the audiologist and had another hearing test. He scored almost exactly the same, including the "mis-shaped" eardrum. The audiologist didn't recommend hearing aids, as he is still in the normal range, but barely. It isn't that he can't hear the sounds, it is just that they are muffled and hard to distinguish. So we were sent back to his pediatrician to see what to do about the eardrums.

Which brings us to today. Hunter's appointment was at 10 am so he didn't go to school today, as it takes about 30 min to get to the doctors. We got there at 5 til 10, after a hectic morning so I was already a little frustrated, but we got there. We checked in and sat down to wait. We are not on the pediatrician side as we go to a family doctor so we were not by any toys; knowing this I brought some for the kids to play with. After waiting for a while the kids were starting to get antsy. I looked at the clock we'd been waiting 20 min. There is a button you can push when you've been waiting for 15 min, so I had Hunter push the button. A few minutes later a nurse came out, turned off the button and called someone in. So I waited another 15 minutes and had Jonathan push the button. Within minutes, our nurse came out and apologized saying the computer hadn't let her know that we'd been checked in. She cleared out a room and we were seen within 5 minutes. I was frustrated, but the kids hadn't been that bad and our doctor took the time to talk to me about Hunter's ears and some other issues that I had questions about (and she gave the kids a bunch of stickers). So she looked in his ears, asked about ear infections and such. She said the Hunter did have fluid in his ears, and may of had this fluid most of his life which would explain the muffled sound, but it never caused ear infections (he's had maybe 2 in his whole life). So she put him on antibiotics in case there is some lingering minor infections and referred him to a ENT. If the antibiotics don't clear up the fluid then the next step is to look at tubes to clear at the fluid. So we got the prescription for the antibiotics, and some more fluoride for the kids' teeth. An hour after our scheduled appointment I headed over to the pharmacy where we waited for our number to be called. When they finally called our number, I headed up to the window. I got our prescriptions and asked a question about some of the other medicines the doc had put on my instructions for Hunter. When the nurse gave them to me and explained them she said to have Hunter take antibiotics and a decongestant at night. I mentioned to her what was still on the market for kids and she said the ask the pharmacist, which I did. Well, the pharmacist didn't know what kind of decongestant the doc wanted, I didn't know either. So the doc was called, but she was on the phone. So I sat down to wait our turn. By now the pharmacy was quite full so we went around the corner to wait. The kids were now starting to bounce off the walls and Jade was being really clingy as it was getting close to lunch and naptime. Well this lady walked by and asked if we'd been waiting long for a pharmacist and I mentioned I had been here for 2 hours and the pharmacy was just the latest pit stop. Then I noticed her tag, she worked for Kaiser. I don't know what her position was, but she stopped and asked about my experience. Listened to the whole thing, asked for my doc's name, Hunter's name and said she would get to the bottom of what happened and said she would get a fire going under someone to get my last question answered. She then walked over to the pediatric side and brought some toys over for my kids to play with. Within ten minutes I had a decongestant and was out the door. It was such a crazy day, but hopefully whatever glitch caused it will get fixed.

But the gist of it is, that Hunter is on medicine to try and clear out the fluid in his ears. If that doesn't work then we'll go to the ENT and look at getting tubes. I'm not sure what the next step is if that doesn't work. I am keeping my fingers crossed that this will all work and we'll get the fluid out and we'll have an Ah ha moment like people have when they get glasses...."Look there are individual leaves on that tree!" Hopefully, with no fluid Hunter will be able to hear clearly and then his speech will improve as he will be able to hear the sounds correctly. I will keep you posted as things go.