Toddler diarrhoea

                       Nice to hear from you again, I am a bit of a heretic about 'flu immunization. The best study about the long term benefit of 'flu immunization in children was done in Britain many years ago in a boy's boarding school. Half of the boys were immunized each year and the other half received no immunization for 'flu. In the first year the non-immunized boys caught the 'flu much more frequently than those who had the immunization. However, after 3 the number of episodes of 'flu were equal over the 3 year period despite 1 group having annual shots. I think we can conclude that catching the'flu gives a better immunity than the immunization.
That said I think if I had neutropaenia, I would have them immunized -  not logical but I would feel terrible if they developed an ovewhelming secondary (to 'flu) bacterial infection which they could not fight very well.
If your 18 month old seems well and is gaining weight, I doubt that he has lactose intolerance - they are usually miserable with lactose intolerance. Your local doc can do a simple test on a fresh stool sample to exclude lactose intolerance. As regards the fruit, there is another sugar intolerance called fructose intolerance. Fructose abounds in fruit. It has the same stool pattern as lactose intolerance and as you describe it.
To exclude this condition there is a fancy test but you can know by excluding all fruit (don't forget the juice!) for 3 weeks and then put him back on fruit and keep a diary of his bowel actions throughout. If he is fructose intolerant he will improve markedly in the fruit-free period only to revert when fruit is reintroduced.
If he has neither lactose or fructose intolerance another 3 weeks off all milk products and no Soy! may be needed but we can discuss that when the time comes.
All the best.
David

>
> Dear David,
>
> Mum passed on your details to me because I was asking
> her a couple of questions. One is about the flu immunizations. Here
> in the USAit seems to be standard for all children and many adults
> to
> have a flu shot every year.Our children have had the other
> immunizations but I suppose since I never felt as though I needed a
> flu shot I wonder about them.They had it last year because we were
> moving to Colorado Springsand I just thought it might be helpful.
> Our children are now 3 and 18 months. Our 3 year old has chronic
> benign neutrapenia (I spoke to you about her previously)
) but apart from one cold and one 24 hour vomiting
> bug has been well throughout the year.
>
> I was also wondering if our 18 month old is lactose
> intolerant….although I’m not so sure now. He is healthy, putting
> on
> weight, and eats almost anything. The only thing is that he
> frequently wakes up with an overflowing pooey nappy in the morning
> and sometimes this happens during the day too. He would regularly
> have 3-4 pooey nappies per day. I have experimented with soy milk
> and sometimes it seems to make a difference and sometimes it
> doesn’t. We do eat quite a lot of fruit and vegetables and whole
> grain foods. I’ve cut back on him eating pears and mandarins but
> still think it’s important for him to have some fruit. What do you
> think?
>
> Thanks for your help