NG Feeding tube -- expereinces?

• By AJSsmom
• Posted October 22, 2009 at 9:41 am
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Hi Nicole,

I'm so sorry your son as to deal with all this at such a young age. My son has had both NG and G tube. I would recommend the G tube via stomach versus the NG tube for comfort and depending on how long he would need the supplementation. If it's over a couple of weeks, I would choose the G tube. Pretty simple procedure and easy to take care of and more comfortable for the kids.

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• By njs
• Posted October 23, 2009 at 9:39 pm
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Even though the NG tube is not what you want, it may help your son. My 11 year old ended up with an NG tube within a month after diagnosis. It was not what I wanted and I felt like I had failed him somewhat. But in hindsight it was a good thing to have. The NG tube took the burden off of my son in having to force food into him. We were able to back off of the constant monitoring, pleading, cajoling, etc that came with hoping/ praying that he would get some more calories into him. If he ate, great, if not we knew he would still get the calories. We eventually settled on the pump running overnight at a very slow rate since that was all that he could handle.

My son was on the NG tube for 7 months. We learned how to insert the tubes ourselves since my son vomited them up quite a few times because of chemo. Re-inserting one was not a huge deal after a while.

I wish you luck with this. It may allow your son to gain weight without all the pressure. Hope this helps.

Nancy, mom to Dale, T-cell ALL now in Long term maintenance

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• By nmm2112
• Posted October 23, 2009 at 10:19 pm
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Thank you so much.... It's very comforting to hear other people's experiences -- we're still going back and forth -- it probably would have been a very good thing had we tried it earlier, and now I feel like we are maybe in the home stretch of LTM (we hope to be done in August...). I guess that's still plenty of time to gain a benefit. I worry about how tough this winter is going to be.

It would definitely take a huge burden off my mind about nutrition.... I know in my heart, he's not getting all that he needs.

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• By chemosucks
• Posted October 24, 2009 at 1:44 pm
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I also have a 3 year old with cancer. I don't have any input for this but I wanted to tell you that he is beautiful! :)

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• By Abismum
• Posted October 25, 2009 at 3:33 pm
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Hi there, my little girl Abi had an NG tube for 10 months and I can honestly say that it was the best thing we ever did. It stopped my husband and I arguing over the best way to get her to eat, it took the pressure off her trying to eat whne she didn't feel like it, I was able to increase or decrease feeds depending on where we were in chemo and she gained and maintained her weight really well. I was great to know that she was getting the perfect balance of nutrition too, rather than McDonalds and fried eggs which were just about all she would eat.
My daughter was 6 at the time and i asked her how she felt about me learning to pass the tube for her, as she would occasionally throw it up too, but she said that was a nurses job and I felt very aware that my role was as her mum, but then other kids react differently and I know loads of mums that pass the tubes no problem.
I truly feel that being well nourished during her treatment played a big part in how well she is doing now and would wholeheartedly say go fot it!! We did ask about a gastrostomy but were told that her chemo meant that she would pretty much have a constant infection so to avoid it if we could, but again I know two little boys who have had them and they have been fantastic.
Best of luck with it all
xxx

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