FRIEND'S Baby Not Growing like He Should

I take my daughter to Dr. David Goff with Cook's Children's Physican network. They are fabulous!! ###-###-####. Good luck.

S., you are good to check on this for her. I would of course recommend having her get a good pediatrician and it sounds like she is doing that. Also, Tarrant County and Dallas County of ECI programs. That is Early Childhood Development. They will come to the house to assess the child on all development (size, response, abilities to do things age appropriate) for all kids under 3. The cost is minimal but depends on her income. If the child qualifies (if they determine he is behind) they will send therapists to her house to help. We had preemie foster babies that got ECI and it was very helpful. Even if he is not a preemie, he may qualify. Any child can be assessed for whatever reason. Good luck - maybe this will help her.

S.,

Has the pediatrician expressed concern over the child or is the mom just concerned? It is very common to have a child in the 50th percentile or more when they are born and taper off into a lower percentile as they grow. A lot depends on the parents (if they're small the children are going to most likely be in a lower percentile range). There is a concern when their weight doesn't match up well with their height. Doctors also get concerned when the percentile drops at a certain rate. I have 6 children. They all started off in or around 75th percentile and dropped to less than 10th. I have one child who is not on the charts at all. We have brought him to specialists (a pediatric gastroenterologist) because he is smaller than my other boys were at his age. I don't worry about my children being small, but with my 7 yo, I felt I needed to really check into everything to make sure there isn't something else going on. We're still checking. Basically at 11 months you want to make sure there isn't a failure to thrive. You want to rule out any problems that cause a child not to thrive as he/she should. Doctors have never had a concern for any of my low percentile children other than a shared concern for the one that tends to be off the charts and not in line with his other siblings. They're not worried, just wanting to make sure (as they shoud) that there is nothing else going on.

M.
SAHM to 6 children ranging in ages from 4-17

Hi S.,
We had the same experience with our little girl. She didn't measure up to the "growth charts" pediatricians typically follow. The DR we were with at the time took a very overly cautious approach and put us through rigorous blood tests, much trauma and much stress as a result of her "growth curve" not seeming to be consistent. We just followed the DR's directions in the matter since we had always had confidence in her judgement, and we just didn't know much about the "failure to thrive" diagnosis. But after months and months of tests that turned up nothing, and LOTS of bills incurred along the way, we finally decided to try another DR, since our original DR wanted to continue putting her through even more tests. We began to suspect this size might just be "normal" for our daughter. Sure enough, it was. And the new DR we found had a completely different approach to the "size" issue, concluding after decades of seeing such cases turn out to be completely benign, that sometimes it pays to just give the kid a chance to grow at their own rate! (Assuming they are healthy in every other way and there's no family history of something else that could be the culpret.) So our girl is very healthy, and she is growing at her own pace just fine, just as we thought. Our current DR is Dr. Elizabeth Dickey. ####-###-####. She's great. Maybe she could help your friend gain some perspective or get to the bottom of things. I would definitely recommend her. Hope this helps! God bless!

Hi S., I went through things very similar with my daughter. If you would like to have your friend email me that's fine. My daughter actually ended up being perfectly okay...just a very petite little girl. But both of my kiddos are on the smaller side. My daughter was born in the 25% and is now in the 3%. We had every test run you can have and all came back normal. Which I new in my heart was the case, but nevertheless, $3000 later I wanted to make sure. So...I'm just paying off the hospital and knowing she's fine. My email is ____@____.com if you or your friend wants to talk I'd be happy to share the details of my experience and refer a doctor if needed.

God Bless,
A.

Her pediatrician should be monitoring her son's growth and if he is truly not growing than I would think that the doc would do something. As long as the son is trending upwards on his growth chart then he is ok and he is growing like he should it's just at his own pace. Our daughter, 10 months old, has been in the 5th percentile since birth for height and weight but since she is trending upwards on the growth chart our pedi tell us there is no need to worry. At every appt he explains the chart to us and shows how she is moving up but it's just a slow move.
If her pedi is not sharing this info with her she needs to get it from him. I would also find another pedi who will show her every step of the way the growth charts and help her with any concerns she may have.

Dear S.,

This happened to my niece, when my sister was breastfeeding. If your friend is breastfeeding, I would recommend seeing a specialist in this area. There are women trained to help other women to breast feed. They are also trained to know when a mother should switch over to other types of feeding. Your pediatrician should know of someone. La Leche League would also be a good help with this.

A.

If the child is failing to thrive, one thing to consider is celiac disease. It is a gluten intolerance it is treated through strict avoidance of all things with gluten (wheat, barley, oats, etc.). A gastro doctor would be able to diagnose this. I can recommend a good pediatric one if your friends thinks she needs one. One in every 133 Americans has this disease, but most don't know they have it.