Monday, July 02, 2007
Giardia Anyone?
I am waiting for a call back from our MD about testing Kenny for Giardia...he has lost 3 pounds since coming home and is eating like a horse! I was wondering if anyone reading this blog who has adopted from Kyrg or is familiar with the orphanages there can tell me if this is common or if there are possibly other parasites we should have him tested for as well....Thanks for any input you can offer!
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3 comments:
Both our boys came home with Salmonella and Xander had Giardia. We had to send the salmonella off to see what kind it was (one has to be treated the others don't, the test takes 6 weeks to come back) and it turned out to be the non-treatment kind.
Our ped didn't want to give them meds for it as the meds make children very sick and so long as the diarhea was under control (no drastic weight loss or dehydration) they would let it go. X and B were on Lactinex (available OTC) and a whole lot of yogurt. Luckily they love yogurt so maybe you can try that with Kenny too.
The bad diarhea cleared up about a month after they were home. We keep them on "maintenance" daily yogurt as it keeps their guts in order. Try Activia as it's got different cultures in it that help with gut issues (it worked the best with the boys).
Hope that helps some! Luckily you're not having to deal with diapers!
Hi Cindy- I don't know about Kyrg, but I am sure it isn't too different from Kaz with regards to parasites. My daughter was tested for all kinds of parasites--they can do them all at once. She had giardia. I have been told that kids should be tested more than once as there is a high rate of false negatives. Hope this helps-Mishelle
My little girl had giardia. She was from Kathmandu. She was not terribly sick just somewhat chronic diarrhea, poor weight gain, and terrible smelling gas. (Afraid my beautiful little girl was very proud of her ability to clear a room with this talent. She still thinks gas if funny.)
I think it interfers with absorption of fats which is why the loss of weight.
It can be catching, hard to get rid of , and hard to detect, so sometimes you have to re test. Be careful about things like disenfecting the bath tub between baths.
The medicine taste horrible so see if they can flavor it a bit. Still does not help much. Really terrible tasting stuff.
They picked it up in my little girl right away, and one weeks round of metronidazole got rid of it.
Also don't be surprised if the Health Dept calls. They didn't seem to be able to understand "adopted from the third world only last week" and kept wanting to know where she picked it up.
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