LifeCare Chiropractic

The Best Chiropractic Care in Mesa, Arizona

Otitis Media

Early Respiratory Infections Increase Childhood Asthma Risk – (10-19-00)

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Early Respiratory Infections Increase Childhood Asthma Risk

This article is contradictory to previous studies that suggest that early infections are needed for a child’s immune system to properly develop. I firmly believe that childhood infections, if left to their natural course, will help that child’s immune system develop. I believe that antibiotics interfere with this natural course. Ponder this…studies have shown that early antibiotic use has been linked to asthma. It is possible that the children in this study actually received antibiotics for their infections. Maybe it was antibiotic use, and NOT the infection itself, that increased the risk of asthma.

Pediatrics 2000;106:e38 Respiratory infections early in life appear to increase the risk of having asthma at 4 years of age. The researchers examined data from 2531 children who had been followed from birth to the age of 4 years. The team found that children who had experienced respiratory infections in their first year were at higher risk of bronchial obstruction at the age of 2 and of asthma at the age of 4 years. After adjusting for confounders, lower respiratory tract infection during the first year of life yielded an odds ratio of 3.4 for asthma. Otitis media during this period was associated with an asthma odds ratio of 1.8 and croup carried an asthma odds ratio of 2.1. Having a common cold during the first 6 months of life doubled the risk of asthma at the age of 4.

Friendly streptococci & recurrences of acute and secretory otitis media – (01-25-01)

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Friendly streptococci & recurrences of acute and secretory otitis media

This is it!! Although this is a small pilot study, this is the evidence to support everything natural practitioners have been saying for many, many years. When you kill off the flora that is supposed to be there, you decrease the body’s ability to protect itself. This study uses normal flora sprayed into the nose to prevent further infection after use of antibiotics. Such a safe and effective therapy to lower the need for antibiotics. Don’t hold your breath, but I hope very much that this story receives the public attention it deserves.

bmj.com Abstracts: Roos et al. 322 (7280): 210

Read entire article here

Otitis Media Guidelines May Not Be Affecting US Physician Habits – (10-23-00)

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Otitis Media Guidelines May Not Be Affecting US Physician Habits

For the past 20 years, research has indicated that antibiotics should not be used for childhood ear infections, and the past 5 or 6 years the recommendations have been strong to avoid antibiotics. And yet the doctors are not getting the message. Does this suggest that they are not getting the info? That is sort of scary…part of being a physician is staying on top of recent developments to improve the efficacy and safety of your practice.

(article) Federal guidelines for treating otitis media with effusion in children may not be making their way into US physicians’ practices, according to survey results released here at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery Foundation. The guidelines were published by the Agency for Health Care Quality and research, now known as the Agency for Healthcare research and Quality (AHRQ), in 1994, to what survey author Dr. Michael G. Stewart called a “warm reception” among pediatricians and otolaryngologists. But the survey of nearly 600 such physicians shows that many are either unaware of the guidelines or unwilling to use them. “It’s very clear that it’s not enough to produce a guideline and just put it out there. Many studies show this with many guidelines, that if you can’t implement them with a concerted educational effort at the clinical level that they will have no effect.” AHRQ now has an initiative called Translating research into Practice, designed to find ways to increase the effectiveness of guidelines.