CMPA with no rash?

Yes!!! My baby had no rash apart from abit of baby acne, but had all other symptoms. I was fobbed off by the GP for ages, until we ended up in A&E! So make sure you follow your gut, keep pushing 🤞

that's interesting, thank you!

Ours doesn't have baby acne either, his skin is literally completely clear all over.

We've been in A&E as well but they didn't give a diagnosis or suspected diagnosis.

I don't know if my gut necessarily says CMPA, I just know something isn't right.

We've been looking at CMPA, lactose intolerance, a functional issue and inflammation residing from his rotavirus vaccination. I feel it could it be any of these at the moment!

Yeah mine didn’t have a rash straight away, it came after the diagnosis. I really had to push for a diagnosis because of the no rash

What symptoms is your little having?

Our LB had every symptom but the rash. We tried SMA Althera and he’s like a different baby now. Still struggles with constipation but every other symptom has gone!

No they don't all get rashes. My boy had bad baby acne and he had 3 random patches of dry skin and that was it.

how long did it take you to get a diagnosis? My boy is 14 weeks now and his skin has always been completely clear. Also, how do they diagnose it? Do they do a test or do you just have to eliminate cows milk and see if they improve?

stomach pain, poo problems, vomiting, wheezing, chronic cough, and inconsolable crying (although that has improved a bit last couple of weeks).

I went to the gp and got a dairy free formula and a dietcian referral, I was seen within 2 weeks by dietician, who suggest after 6 weeks of dairy free formula adding an oz a time of kendamil to his dairy free to see if he reacted, he reacted instantly, so we stopped straight away. We now see the dietcian every 6 months, I could tell it was cmpa because after a few days on the new formula he was a different baby!

that's great that you've had such an improvement! Were you already formula feeding and just switched to a different formula? Our boy is on lactulose for the constipation which does seem to be helping

that's good to know, thanks. My boy's skin is completely clear and has been from day 1. No baby acne or dry patches or anything.

that's good that the dietician saw you so quickly. We're waiting for our referral to Paediatrics since they're not sure what it is. There's a few possibilities and CMPA is one of them. I'm glad you got to the bottom of it and have had such an improvement!

My baby is going through this too, we only notice a change in her poo. Poo was always a green colour. We are still awaiting to find out if it is actually a dairy issue. Did anyone else babies poo change colour to green?

My little girl had no other symptoms except for blood in her stools when first diagnosed. However when they did the milk challenge she did get a rash but maybe its because from cutting it out completely and then reintroducing she was more sensitive to it? 🤷‍♀️ xx

blood in his poo is one of his symptoms. What's the milk challenge? X

@Rebecca so when our little girl was 9 days old she had blood in her stools, we took her to thr drs and they sent us to a&e. The peadiatric drs said it could be several things with CMPA being one of them so they instantly put us on a hydrolysed prescription formula and also ran tests for other things. All other tests came back fine and the bleeding stopped so it looked highly likely it was cmpa so after 2 weeks they asked us to switch her back on to her original cows milk formula to see what happened to confirm the diagnosis and that's when more symptoms appeared - rash, congestion, constipation, mucous and blood in stools. So then it confirmed it definitely was cmpa and they switched her back on to the hydrolysed formula. Xx

One thing I've learnt from talking to others is that it's a nightmare getting a diagnosis for CMPA and that a lot of GPs just put it down to colic. What symptoms does your little one have? Do you BF or formula feed? Xx

thanks for that. When we took ours to A&E when he had blood in his poo they said it was from a reaction to his rotavirus vaccine.

So the challenge is basically just removing the cows milk, then adding it back in and seeing if it flares up again?

I'm EBF so I'm assuming I'd do that with removing cows milk from my diet xx

yep the GP has already wrote it off as colic! We have a really helpful and supportive health visitor who is helping us but the GPs keep fobbing us off. We do now finally have a referral to Paediatrics.

His symptoms are trapped wind, stomach pain, pain and distress when pooing (but then it's soft and liquidy when he gets it out), mucus in poo, blood in poo, diarrhoea, vomiting, congestion, wheezy, and a cough.

The things they're going to investigate are CMPA, lactose intolerance, a functional disorder and inflammation from his rotavirus vaccine reaction.

He's EBF xx

yes exactly that ☺️

Yes so my friends little boy has CMPA and she was EBF, the GP kept dismissing her and saying the symptoms were colic but like you she had a really good HV. So she decided to remove dairy from her own diet to test it, and his symptoms cleared up and then she tried dairy again and they came back instantly. So then she went back to the GP and finally got referred.

It's good you've got a referral now though, have they said how long you will have to wait?

The symptoms sound very much like CMPA - especially as your little one has congestion etc. too as you'd think if it was a problem with the digestive system then they wouldn't be getting those symptoms. Xx

thank you, thats really helpful.

I had thought about doing that myself but I have dietary issues myself so need the guidance of a dietician.

We have an appointment for January so not too long considering NHS wait times!

Another GP we saw did suspect CMPA. The original GP said the congestion was a result of his reflux. The reflux isn't really an issue anymore though but the congestion is still there xx

Hey! Hope you’re good 😊 I know this was a while ago but just wondering how you got on in the end? My LG is 2 months and experiencing all the same symptoms. X

hi! Ah not good I'm afraid. Baby ended up very ill and in hospital and then we finally got the CMPA diagnosis. He was 6 months when he was diagnosed. He's been great since that's all been managed though and is 1 in a few days and has been symptom free for almost the whole 6 months since diagnosis (minus the 6 weeks or so it took for the inflammation to calm down and his gut to heal) xx

Aw I’m so sorry to hear that happened!

It’s a real pain trying to get doctors etc to take things seriously. My LG had a choking episode today due to the reflux she’s experiencing. I took her to the doctors and showed them the video from the monitor, where’s she’s clearly silent, choking and wide eyed and scared and the doctor just asked me ‘what exactly do you find distressing about the video?’ I don’t know the fact she looked like she couldn’t breathe and I had to whip her out the crib and frantically throw her over my knee for her to spit up and breathe again!

But honestly thank you for sharing, and I’m so pleased to hear he is better now! X

it was really scary! It breaks my heart that he had to get that ill before they took it seriously.

I can totally relate. I'm so sorry that was your experience, especially with something as scary as choking!

What's your health visitor like? We initially had a really good one and she was helpful in pushing for a diagnosis for us. The other thing I would recommend is referring to the Infant Feeding Team (you can self refer if the GP isn't helpful). We saw them for a different issue but they were so helpful and referred us to the next service we needed straight away. If I'd known they existed when we were struggling with the cmpa I'd have gone to them straight away x