Infection ...Again ;(

After years of Chronic double ear infections, speech delay and finally having tubes put in Keelie has been sick and infection free for almost a year now. She is also finally doing speech therapy and talking so much better. However...... right before we left Washington her ENT dr told us that her left tube looked liked it was getting ready to fall out( which happens about 6months to a year after they are put in). She advised that we follow up with Ent in Colorado as soon as possible to keep an eye on the tube and also to make sure we don't retract back to previous issues, like hearing and speech problems, fluid in her ears and infections.

   About 3 weeks ago we saw Keelie's new primary care dr who put in the refferal for Ent and also Audiology. She also stated that Keelies ear was so compacted with wax deep in her ear that she couldn't even see the tube and she wanted Ent to clean it and look at it. If you know anything about tricare, they take their sweet ass time to do anything and of course took almost 2 weeks to put through the refferal. However they didn't put it through right and here we are still stuck without seeing a dr.

    2 nights ago Keelies ear started draining very thick very yucky fluid and she started to complain that it hurt. I called her dr's nurse the following morning about the ent refferal and explained to her what was going on. She had us come in right away so they could look at Keelies ear. Low and behold the poor child has a severe ear infection that has punctured a whole through her tympanic membrane. The membrane is so swollen that the dr is unable to see if the tube is even in her ear still.That would explain her lack of balance, crabbiness and lack of listening skills recently! With a fancy little lighted tool the Dr was able to clean some of the deep packed puss,blood, fluid and wax out of her ear and then gave her a heavy antibiotic and ear drops. We were once again referred to Ent, yet still waiting for tricare to get off their asses.

    The tubes had cleared everything up as far as ear infections and Keelie has been even cold free for the last year, but now we have started all over and I'm really hoping once this clears up we are not on the track back to more ear infections and another set of tubes.................................