Help please, baby's antibiotics

[Marijn]

My son's 14 month old baby is on Flucloxacillin antibiotics. He needs to take it four times a day. My son says he is going to give his baby a dose at 8pm at night and 8am when baby wakes up (which is a 12 hour gap), plus two other doses. But my sister says that he needs to have the doses as near to 6 hours apart that is conveniently possible.
Is the 12 hour gap between doses ok, or will it render the antibiotic course practically useless?

[Sqad]

It it is a decision between waking the baby up at night or missing the 6 hour dose......................then miss the middle of the night dose.

No big deal.

[RATTER15]

I would just give the last one as late as possible and the early one as early as possible to try and reduce the 12 hour gap.

[Marijn]

Thanks Sqad. Then presumably it's ok to have 8pm, 8am, 12pm and 4pm and it doesn't matter too much that the other doses are only 4 hours apart?

[Sqad]

That regime looks fine to me.

[redcrx]

i used to do them with breakfast, lunch and tea and then last thing before bed and never had any trouble with them not working for my kids.

[Marijn]

Thank you very much.
Do you have any tricks how to get baby to take the medicine? My son gently squeezes it from a syringe into baby's mouth, but baby spits it out because it tastes disgusting. It is to be taken one hour BEFORE food, so not sure if he's allowed to have something nice to eat to disguise the flavour. What do you think?

[Mamyalynne]

Always squeeze the medicine into the side of the cheek, less likely to be spat or dribbled out, yes offer a drink afterwards to remove taste and wash down.

[Marijn]

Thank you to everyone who has answered so far.

[Marijn]

He is still spitting it out as it tastes disgusting (I can verify that, as I tasted it). I have just bought him some honey, jam and mango puree to mix it with to disguise the taste. He hasn't had another dose as yet. Does anyone know any tried and trusted foods that will disguise the flavour of this particularly bitter antibiotic. My sister has said it's best not to mix it with milk based foods.

[ladyalex]

I'd give the surgery a ring and see if you can get anything more palatable for the poor wee soul.
Otherwise, I'd have thought try to disguise it in any food he likes.

[Marijn]

I guess they wouldn't want to switch antibiotics at this stage. He likes grapes :-)

[ladyalex]

Give them a try and see....if you cannot get the antibiotic into him they're not doing a lot of good.

Bummer about the grapes.....:-))

[cathfromsaron]

doses are usually spaced out during waking hours! hope he gets better soon xx

[Marijn]

Thanks everyone for your answers. Maybe a hollowed out grape with the medicine inside would do the trick. Don't want to put him off grapes though. It's a difficult one.

[wolf63]

Here is a similar thread http://www.theanswerb.../Question1060790.html maybe you will get more help there.

Andrew1707 says to use a syringe. He didn't mention how many adults are required to give the medication. ;-)

[Marijn]

Thank you wolf. He does have it in a syringe, but he starts blowing raspberries before it's even in his mouth. There was an answer in the other thread that said to lean him back a bit, that's worth a try.