He Has EoE: He's Growing!

Thursday, August 12, 2010

He's Growing!

Today we headed back to the nutritionist for a follow-up. She was very pleased with his weight. Since he started on EleCare, he's gained a half a pound each week! We are so very lucky that he will drink this stuff. It doesn't taste good at all. I guess in his short life he really hasn't tasted too many things, so he doesn't have a wide variety of things to compare it to. It was slow going at first, but after a few days he decided it wasn't so horrible, and for that we are incredibly grateful.

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Who is he?

He is Oliver and he is three years old. Oliver was diagnosed with EoE two weeks after his first birthday. He was diagnosed as failure to thrive at nine months old at which point we pursued some blood tests. His celiac panel came back somewhat positive so we were referred to a pediatric gastroenterologist. We met with the GI on Oliver's first birthday at which point we scheduled an endoscopy to find out exactly what was going on. The endoscopy showed no signs of celiac, but instead a multitude of eosinophils in his esophagus. So celiac was ruled out and Eosinophilic Esophagitis became his new diagnosis.

What is EoE?

An eosinophil is a white blood cell that is an important part of the immune system, just not when found in large numbers in one's esophagus! Eosinophilic Esophagitis (EoE) is the result of an abnormal amount of eosinophils in the esophagus. These eosinophils are often caused by food protein and the eosinophils cause inflammation in the esophagus. Treatment options are dietary management (removal of trigger foods) and topical corticosteroid treatment. The steroids control the inflammation in the esophagus and suppress the eosinophils, but once treatment stops, the eosinophils will return unless the trigger foods are all removed.