The "new" recommendation for ear infections is the "watch and see" method. We are not to rush our children into the doctors office for treatment. Ear infections can and often do (I have read...) go away on their own.
Well I watched and I saw my daughters eardrum rupture. Also something that seems to be recommended by some sites as no big deal. I read MayoClinic, WebMD, Medline Plus, and AskDrSears. No conclusive information on this topic. Some suggest to wait to bring your child in until s/he has severe pain (Faye seemed to have that instantaneous), some said if you see blood coming from the ear after rupture, some said if your eardrum ruptures there will be clear fluid, blood, and even pus, but with no other recommendations.
I've got to tell you though... I've decided this "watch and see" bit is not for me. At least not for Faye. She had an infection in the opposite ear in Feb. We brought her in right away in the morning because she was down right miserable all night. We got her on Amoxicillin and her pain was gone by that night. I accidentally didn't give her the full 7 days of it (eek), but it went away very quickly and didn't return.
Thus time she was in miserable pain for a day and a half until her eardrum ruptured. She got relief from that and was able to sleep (a lot!) during the day, but then she was in pain again. The next day most of her pain went away and her fever had been down to normal temp for almost two days, she was dripping everywhere though. About 36-48 hours after her eardrum ruptured, we brought her in to get checked out. We ended up with $50 ear drops! Four drops, two times a day, seven days. Yikes!
Next time we'll go back for the Amoxicillin. Torturing her isn't worth it. She goes from zero to 50 in 60 seconds and if she hadn't taken the antibiotics for the first infections, they eardrum would have burst too.
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