United Brachial Plexus Network, Inc.

tina - guess what! I already wrote to the good guy to thank him!! He had to know and I wanted him to know how grateful I was for Maia to have such a good experience.

Francine--it was explained that with the "deformity" & dysfunction of the eustachian tube this all led to an increase in pressure on the ear drum. While this is what the myryngotomy tube/button was to relieve, when her allergies kicked into high gear, more drainage occured and was more than the tube/button could take care of, thus allowing it to move or dislodge. This movement or falling out is a common experience, even w/o the dysfunctional tube. I should also have added that her whole ear/canal structure is the same, very tight and constricted, small so to speak. And we have never experienced ear wax coming from that side either. It just builds up in there--making ear boogies! Would we do the tubes again--absolutely, no matter how many times it was needed. They worked wonders until ragweed season hit! In fact, we were getting ready to have it done again when we were finally able to get the last ear infection to clear up nicely and she hasn't had one since late January. I don't know about how long others took but she was only gone from her room 5 minutes and came back very alert--screaming her bloody murder for her Mommy, Mamaw, gankee and pas. Normally it is a procedure that can be performed in the office for children/adults that are able to cooperate and hold perfectly still for a few seconds. Most kids under 5 (for this doc) have it done under some kind of anesthesia due to the fear and inability to cooperate.

All hearing tests so far have come back as inconclusive on the bpi side. While her ENT says that there have been no direct correlations to the BPI, and he doesn't see a tremendous amount of BPI kids he had noted that he did not have one of the BPI kids that did not have some dysfunction or even hearing loss--butyet again, that is why they see him. So who knows about the ones he doesn't see.