When a child has ear pain, it is more likely that he has otitis media. This diagnosis is made by doctors in more than 90% of young patients with acute ear pain. The insidiousness of this ailment lies in the fact that often the ears of children get sick at night, as well as in situations where it is difficult to get to the hospital (in the country, on vacation, after swimming in the river).
Painful sensations with otitis media are intense, the child cannot stand. Can you help him with folk remedies? We will consider this issue in more detail.
Symptoms and Signs
Otitis media is an inflammatory process in one of the ear sections. It can be outside, middle and inside. The simplest and less painful is otitis externa. With it, the auricle directly becomes inflamed. Internal - the most severe of all otitis media, it affects the labyrinth, the auditory ramifications in the temporal region. However, labyrinthitis usually does not come on its own, but is a complication of otitis media of the middle ear. This disease is leading among children.
It is not difficult to recognize otitis media.
Its symptoms are quite striking and characteristic:
Acute, sudden ear pain.
Noise and extraneous sounds (tinnitus).
Temperature rise possible.
Liquid or purulent discharge from the ear is possible.
General malaise and headache.
Otitis media can be acute or chronic.
- Chronic the course of the disease usually occurs when the usual otitis media was treated in the wrong way, in the wrong way and at the wrong time.
- If there is purulent discharge, we are talking about purulent otitis media.
- If there is no discharge, or it is clear and liquid, without blood and clots, otitis media will catarrhal.
- If the symptoms are almost not pronounced, and on average pus is already accumulating, then this otitis media will be called exudative. It occurs due to the penetration of infection into the cavity from the nasopharynx. This otitis media is quite dangerous, and if left untreated, it can lead to hearing loss.
Children with ear infections behave differently. Babies begin to worry, cry for no apparent reason, give up their breasts. At the same time, crying is not monotonous, it alternates with a shrill cry. If a baby is put on a sore ear while breastfeeding, it will begin to calm down.
Older children can tell their parents about ear pain if they already know how to express their feelings in words. If they still do not know what to guess about the problem, mothers and fathers can use the child's changed behavior: anxiety, detachment, loud crying, the child will rub his ear with his hand.
If adults lightly press on the tragus (a small protrusion in front of the auricle), then the pain in the ear will increase many times over, which the child will not hesitate to report with a loud cry. If after pressing the behavior does not change, the cause of the ear pain is not otitis media.
What is the danger?
Otitis media is a rather dangerous disease, since it is not only painful, but also fraught with complications. Untreated otitis media threatens to turn into a labyrinthitis, to hit the inner ear. The most "harmless" consequence that can occur if otitis media is treated incorrectly is a critical hearing loss. Other complications are more dangerous - complete deafness and purulent meningitis, which can lead to death or turn a healthy child into a severely disabled person.
In no case can you ignore ear pain. A child can be given first aid, but a specialist doctor should treat inflammation of the hearing organs in all situations, without exception.
When is it impossible to do with folk methods?
Folk remedies for the treatment of otitis media cannot be dispensed with. Whatever the ailment - external or internal, alternative medicine can only temporarily relieve unpleasant symptoms, reduce pain, but they are unable to cure the ear.
It is worth forgetting about the use of traditional medicine recipes in cases where the ear hurts in an infant, there is purulent discharge or a liquid with blood impurities is released from the auricle, the intense pain has been replaced by silence - the child has ceased to perceive sounds with a sore ear. All of these conditions require urgent medical attention, not onion juice compresses.
Folk remedies
Nevertheless, if you need to provide a child with first aid, then folk remedies may well be suitable for this. If there is a great desire to treat a child in this way, then it is imperative to inform the doctor about this at the reception. With mild inflammation, the doctor may authorize the use of folk recipes.
The difficulty is that some of the most effective home remedies need to be prepared well in advance and stored for a rainy day.
Sagebrush
To prepare the product, you will need wormwood flowers (1 teaspoon). Plant raw materials should be infused with vodka or rubbing alcohol (50 ml) for a week. The resulting infusion does not need to be buried in the ears, cotton turundas are moistened in it and injected for several hours in children with otitis media. This helps to relieve pain and some of the inflammation.
Walnut
You don't need fruits, but leaves. They need to be chopped finely, folded into a jar and filled with vegetable oil. Under a lid in a dark and cool place, the jar should be kept for about three months. In case of acute earache with the resulting product, cotton swabs are made into the ears at least three times a day. Walnut leaf juice has antimicrobial effect and reduces swelling.
Onion
This vegetable will help relieve the acute pain of otitis media and aid in the healing process. To prepare the drops, you need to rub the onion on a grater, squeeze the juice with gauze, dilute it with water or saline in a ratio of 1: 3. You can drip into the ear only if the eardrum is intact. Onions will help return deteriorated hearing after suffering from otitis media and in the chronic form of the disease. To do this, bake a large onion in the oven, squeeze the juice out of it and instill it in the ear up to three times a day.
Lavrushka
This popular spice can relieve a child's condition with purulent otitis media. Laurel leaves need to be chopped, covered with boiling water and left under the lid for an hour. Then strain and do with the broth cotton balls in the ears 3-4 times a day.
Aloe juice
Squeeze the juice from the fleshy leaf of the plant. You can bury it in your ears three times a day. If the child is still small, then the plant juice should be diluted with boiled water or saline in half. Aloe perfectly heals, relieves swelling and inflammation, has antimicrobial effect. In order not to harm the baby, such procedures should be carried out only on the condition that the eardrum is not damaged.
The danger of self-medication
It is unacceptable to treat otitis media at home. Firstly, because at home it is almost impossible to determine "by eye" the nature of otitis media and the degree of damage to the organ of hearing. Doctors use special tools for this. Secondly, it is difficult to find the right remedy, because medicines must not only eliminate the causative agent of the infection, but also have the ability to penetrate into the tissues of the ear, into all its departments.
Traditional medicine uses antibiotics, vasoconstrictor nasal drops, ear drops with anti-inflammatory and analgesic effects in the treatment of otitis media. In this case, the condition of the tympanic membrane plays an important role. If it breaks under the pressure of purulent masses, then you cannot drip into the ear.
Since many folk remedies are based precisely on instillation, it is dangerous to use them without exact knowledge whether the membrane is intact.
What can’t be done?
- When treating purulent otitis media, you should not warm up the ear with warming moist compresses and heating pads, since heat will only increase inflammation. Inflamed ears need dry heat - cotton wool, wool scarf, etc.
- With purulent otitis media, steam inhalation should not be done
Tips
- When treating ear inflammation, the child needs to drink as much fluid as possible, this will prevent the exudate that forms in the tympanic cavity from thickening and turning into pus.
- It is better to accompany the treatment of otitis media with bed rest.
