penicillin allergy in kids

so i've had a lovely weekend- we went upstate on friday, planned on staying until tomorrow. 10 mo was on augmentin for a ear infection since sunday, but was fine. late saturday afternoon, he developed some hives on his legs. ok, i figure he racting to the medication. my mom (Were in my parents place) didnt have benadryl, so we went to get swome- 4 stores and 1.5 hours later, we got some. byt this point, it was 10:30 pm or so. came home, went to ds ot give him some benadryl- and both arms and legs are covered. then i get nervous- called ped (i'm sure he appreciated a 11 pm page on a saturday night), he said give benadryl and monitor him, and he will be seeing ermergencies today if i need him.
sunday morning- ds woke- MUCH worse- its all over his tummy, face, back too. I wanted him to be seen today, so we packed out fast. called peds office, got hte service, todl them we are coming in. ped took one look, said it is a SEVERE drug reaction. not anphylactic, this time at least. he gave us a antihistamine, much stronger than benadryl.
DS has had 2 doses- not better at all. i think its still spreading, but its hard to tell. how long would you give it? ped is in tomorrow for emergencies if i need it. he did say if its nto helping, he woudl do a steroid.
second- DS has had 3 ear infections already. ped said if it continues, its traight ot ent, since it becomes very difficult ot manage with limited antibiotics- has anyoen dealt with a kid with multiple ear infections and antibiotic allergies?

Re: penicillin allergy in kids

anyone have any advice? my poor baby looks AWFUL . he is literally covered head to toe i nhives.
he was put in atarax- and its making him crazy, to top it all off.

Re: penicillin allergy in kids

I really am not sure

I myself as a child ( and even now as an adult) have an allergy to any Sulfa meds, but I'm not sure if Aumentin is in that category...

The most I ever got from it is the rash, but I remind the Dr everytime he has to prescribe me an antibiotic about it...


Can the service have the doctor call you back ? Or do you have any walk-in emergency clinics nearby ?

I'm sure there are many different types of antibiotics out there, and hopefully one agrees with him

Re: penicillin allergy in kids

Jordan has a penecillin allergy, she was about 8 months old when we figured it out. She had a very bad rash(but nothing else) She too was covered from head to toe. This was a long time ago, she is nine now. I do remember the rash lasting quite a few days. I do not believe it got worse after we stopped but It did not get better right away either. If it is getting worse, I would call the emergency #

Re: penicillin allergy in kids

im so sorry that you have to go through this... I hope that your baby is doing better!!! we just went through this with my 15 month old... she had augmentin 2X before, but this time she broke out in terrible hives... We went to the ped and he said benadryl and monitor. The hives got really really bad and she was all swollen, eyes, neck, hands, feet, so we called the emergency number and went to the ER. They gave her a steroid, said to continue the benadryl. It got a little better, but then got even worse the next night. Back to the ER and they upped the dosage of the steroid, continued benadryl and added claritin. She was back to normal the next day. She ended up having a rare dermatological reaction called erethema multiforme. She was such a trooper the whole time. Even though she looked absolutely horrible, swollen and with hives, very itchy, she was playful and in a good mood. Her appetite was off though... and she drank a lot more than usual.

Ped said absolutely no more penicillin antibiotics. She has had another ear infection since and was put on azythromiacin. Ped said nothing about seeing an ENT. This is her 4th ear infection in 4 months. (just started daycare)

Although it didn't seem like it at the time, everything went really fast. The hives started on a friday morning, peaked sat. night and were a lot better by sun morning. By sunday night she was 100% back to normal. Good luck!!! Keep us posted.

Re: penicillin allergy in kids

SAme thing happened to DS about a month ago...he was on amoxicillin for an ear infection and woke up covered in hives to the point the doctor actually looked at him and saw "wow, this is what they take pictures of and put in medical books." he reacted well to benadryl.

He has since had 2 ear infections (well, one the first one that never cleared up because we stopped the amoxicillin) and the doctors gave him zythromicyn (sp?) basically baby z-pac and he's been fine. The first ear infection cleared up fine. We are waiting to go back to the ped next week since he just finished the second round of antibiotics this week.

My doctor said that although he can't have any type of "illin" antibiotics there are others out there that work just as well.

Good luck!

Re: penicillin allergy in kids

DS had (has?) a penicillin allergy. When he was a baby he got a bad rash/hives. He started to get ear infections weekly from daycare, but the doctors just prescribed other medications. There were a ton of other non-penicillin options - like a Z-pac. He ended up getting tubes anyway because the ear infections never stopped, but I think that was because he always spit out the medicines!

Re: penicillin allergy in kids

My dd had a rash on her neck, back and upper arms about 1/2 way into her 10 day perscription. Ped said to bring her in to check the reaction. He actually thought that the rash was roseola as a reaction to the 104 fever that the ear infection had caused her a few days before, and not a reaction to penicillin.

Re: penicillin allergy in kids