Healing Childhood Ear Infections: Prevention, Home Care, and Alternative Treatment [Paperback]

Michael A. Schmidt Ph.D (Author), Doris Rapp (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 8, 1996

Ear infections are still the leading reason parents take their child to a doctor. To combat infections, parents and doctors employ arsenals of antihistamines and antibiotics, and too quickly resort to ear tubes and surgery. In this updated and revised second edition of his bestselling Childhood Ear Infections, Dr. Michael Schmidt describes the current controversy in medical journals questioning existing treatments for chronic earaches.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"There are better ways of managing children's ear problems. Dr. Schmidt's comprehensively researched and referenced new book provides answers parents and professionals are seeking. My highest recommendation."
- William G. Crook, M.D., Fellow, American Academy of Pediatrics

"This book offers hope, solid information, and sound advice for discouraged parents and clinicians. It shines a much-needed, brilliant light on a common, troubling, often chronic childhood illness. It should be sent home from the hospital with every newborn - and be required reading for all clinicians."
- Jan T. Adams, M.D., Clinical Professor, University of Minnesota Medical School

About the Author

Dr. Michael A. Schmidt is the author of Beyond Antibiotics, Brain-Building Nutrition, Childhood Ear Infections, and Tired of Being Tired.  He did his Ph.D. research in molecular medicine and biochemistry within the Life Sciences Division at NASA Ames Research Center, with studies in neuroscience and metabolomics at Lancaster University.  He teaches in the Metabolomics Training Program at the University of Colorado, and he works closely with the human disease modeling laboratory (3-D tissue analogues group) and with the human space flight initiative of the suborbital research group at NASA.  He has applied his work in functional genomics and metabolomics to human disease states, as well as to methods to enhance human performance.  Dr. Schmidt co-founded Sovaris Aerospace, which addresses problems of complexity in space biomedicine, along with Cyvia Neurosystems, which develops EEG-based neurophysiology tools.  He is a gifted communicator, who has spent his career translating complex topics in science and medicine to general audiences.

Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: North Atlantic Books; 2 Sub edition (May 8, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 155643216X
• ISBN-13: 978-1556432163
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 1.1 x 8.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #285,972 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Resource for Parents, April 15, 1999

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Healing Childhood Ear Infections: Prevention, Home Care, and Alternative Treatment (Paperback)

By the time my son was 18 months old, he had had seven ear infections in the past six months and was scheduled to have surgery for tubes. My father suggested I research alternative medicine first, so I bought this book. What a wonderful source of information that most peditricians don't tell you. We tried a handful of rememdies recommended in this book, all with great success. It is now 9 months later and my son has only been diagnosed with one ear infection during this time, and to our surprise when we told the peditrician we didn't want to treat this ear infection with antibiotics, he agreed that it was best NOT to treat it, that his own immune system would fight it. And guess what? It did!

21 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars We avoided surgery!, September 23, 2005

By 

Susanne Navas (CT, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Healing Childhood Ear Infections: Prevention, Home Care, and Alternative Treatment (Paperback)

My 4 year old daughter was diagnosed with reduced hearing 7 months ago; turned out she had fluid in both ears. The ENT (ears, nose, throat specialists) put her on antibiotics. Did nothing. Then we went away for a month and upon our return, we had her checked again. Fluid had decreased in 1 ear but was still strong in the other. ENT feared it would impact her learning (the decreased hearing) and lead to ear infections (they couldn't believe she hadn't had any, to my knowledge,since she was about 2). In the meantime, my 1.5 year old son also had 1 ear infection after the other, and when we returned from our trip he also was checked - fluid in both ears, plus a lingering infection they treated with antibiotics. They strongly urged me to get tubes in their ears. Our niece had them inserted and my sister as well as everyone else said it's no big deal, the worst part is seeing your child unconscious as it's general anaesthesia, but they bounce right back. I made the surgery appt and then my dad sent me an article from the Wall Street Journal citing studies that concluded the tube surgery is done way too often, and unnecessarily. Since this was coming from my very conservative dad, I thought I'd better question establishment. So I got this book, "Healing Childhood Ear Infections" by Dr. Schmidt. After 1 chapter I canceled the surgery. Instead, I got them into chiropractic care, removed dairy (cows milk) from their diets, and took them to a naturopath who put them on 3 supplements: minerals for their immune systems, and something to thin the mucous. Today I took my daughter to the ENT for a check-up (1 month after trying alternative treatments) and they were shocked - no more fluid, perfect hearing! You should have seen how proud she was when they told us. My son still remains to be checked, but knock on wood, has been infection-free since I started all this. The kids love the chiropractor - my son screams when his turn is over - and there are plenty of dairy alternatives out there (soy is also to be avoided or at least moderated but my son loves goats milk yoghurt). The supplements mix in with their juices so they don't even notice them. Anyway, I'm telling you this so that you question your own kids' treatments. According to this book, once a kid is on antibiotics it's very likely he'll develop another infection (ear) soon thereafter. In most countries, they're not even prescribed unless the baby is under 1 or has had a high fever (over 101) for 3 days. Plus, this book stated that most US children have a very nutrient-defficient diet and in particular lack minerals such as magnesium & zinc, which are very important for the immune system. Hopefully you can all benefit from this - and although I don't know which of my 3 forms of treatment did the trick with my daughter, I'm going to continue all 3. Thank goodness for this book, which gave me the tools and the courage to try safer alternatives.

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Explains why traditional treatments don't work, February 19, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Healing Childhood Ear Infections: Prevention, Home Care, and Alternative Treatment (Paperback)

This book is a must for any parent who is experiencing the endless rounds of doctor's visits and antibiotics to treat chronic ear infections. This book explains in layman's terms the reasons why traditional treatments for chronic ear infections don't work. Some doctors jump-the-gun and prescribe antibiotics when there is fluid in the ear, but not infection. This can harm rather than hurt the child and set them up for a lot of other problems down-the-road.