Wrong diagnosis: Swollen adenoids instead of ?

[Guest guest]

Hello,

I recently went to a new ENT dr with our 5 year old son Lukas (cause he

fevered while we were out of town) and he said the problem with him was

infected and swollen adenoids.

This was big news to us since we since november have been thinking that the

fevers that he gets every 20-30 days were fevers. This was however our

own belief and never diagnosed, although the doctors we´ve seen (2 other

ENTs) couldn´t rule it out. What they have said is that it is tonsillitis

and we

are therefore scheduled to remove the tonsils in April. We never believed

this diagnosis since the fevers and symptoms go away on their own, with or

without antibiotics. We therefore surfed the internet found out about

and this site. Despite not believing in their diagnosis, we wanted to do the

tonsillectomy in the hope that this would get rid of .

Lukas has <= 104 fevers, which come every 20-30 days, strong headaches

(always forehead), sometimes (twice) mouth ulcers. The fevers are gone again

after 1-3 days, but the headache lingers, also between episodes. He might

also have a runny nose and/or asthma/bronchitis cough during and between

episodes. (As I see it, the colds, the symptoms between episodes, and the

short and relatively low fevers are all symptoms that are not typical for

.) I have charted his fevers since June 2007 but he has had them for

longer than that (years?).

I don´t know if this was the first time an ENT looked at the adenoids after

ha had them removed (1 year and 4 months ago - due to hearing problems.

Apparently it is normal that they grow back.). It shouldn´t have been, but

maybe the first 2 drs overlooked to do so and that the adenoids actually is

the cause of the fevers.

As far as I understand this is the first diagnosis that actually explains

Lukas´ main complaint: the forehead pains. Apparently when the adenoids are

swollen they clog the channels to the forehead sinuses (although such small

kids don´t have the sinuses - only the channels), and create pressure on the

forehead. The tonsillitis diagnosis does not explain this problem. Nor does

really (although headache is one of the symptoms, I rarely find any of

you writing about your childrens´ headaches...). It is also well known that

chronic sinusitis can cause repeated fevers.

Assuming that the adenoid diagnosis is correct,

1) Why do the adenoids become infected every 20-30 days?

2) Why do antibiotics not make a difference? How come they should help if it

is tonsillitis, but not the adenoids?

3) How do we keep this from coming back every month? The ENT we last saw,

said something about improving his immune system, but how do you do this?

Any answers/thoughts you might have, or if you have experienced the same,

would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Karin, mom to Lukas 5 years old.