Low to none weight gain

Hi all!

My son is 6mo old, born 4 pounds 12 oz – was an IUGR baby. Started having problems eating at about 1 month. The problem was that he was not eating much. He later started refusing to eat, cry, arch his back and not gain much weight. He is now 10 pounds 9 oz, at 6 mo of age.

We were initially told that IUGR babies are a pain to feed and that he doesn’t have an appetite. However, I see him hungry, and he tries to eat and he just stops after a couple of gulps. He hurries to take those gulps and his tummy makes some sort of noise and he stops eating. We use Avent bottles and are still using slow flow #2 nipples so that he is able to control the flow. I have to burp him very frequently to get a little bit of food into him. He eats better when he is asleep. He is on breast milk (I pump, ugh) and Alimentum, because i do not have enough milk for him.

Our pediatrician put him on Zantac, which initially helped and then stopped working. A week ago we got a prescription for Prevacid – 3mg. The pharmacies here make a compound. I got a print out of what goes in it — only two things, the drug itself and sodim bicorbonate 8.4%. They told me at the pharmacy that it needs to be given twice a day 1.5 ml at a time, and it doesnt matter when, nor do i need to wait 30 min before feeding him.

My son was having big issues taking zantac – it does taste awful, and we kept giving it to him for the first 3 days along with prevacid. He kept spitting it out. Prevacid compound does’nt taste much better, and my son still spits it out. We take several attempts to give him the medication.

Past two days have been particularly bad- i am ready to cry each time i try to feed him. He keeps eating just a little bit and then starts crying. So i fed him about 7 times today already and he just completely refused his meal. His total daily intake averages about 580ml a day. For the past 3 weeks he gained only 20 grams. We are going to see our pediatrician tomorrow.

What are we missing? I have read a lot of posts on this board, but i still have questions below. Please let me know if you had similar issues and what you did to resolve them.

– Do i need to wait 30 min before giving my son food, after administering Prevacid?

– What can i use to give him the medicine so that he doesnt spit it back out? I use a medicine dispenser now, but he puts up a fight every time we give it to him.

– Does anyone have an IUGR baby with similar issues? What are your experiences?

– Its been 1 week on prevacid, and i am not seeing much of an effect, how dramatic are the results by the time he has been on it for 2 weeks from your experiences?

– Zegerid is not prescribed to infants here in Canada, what are my options in terms of meds, if prevacid doestn work?

We had x-rays, sweat test and multiple blood test (thyroid etc) that all came back normal. My ped said if prevacid doesnt help with eating and weight gain she will ask to run another test, but doesnt want to do it now as it involves swallowing a radioactive chemical.

Thanks for all your help!